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THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
Volume VI
THE PHILOSOPHY OF
ERNST CASSIRER
THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
PAUL ARTHUR SCHILPP, Editor
Already Published:
THE PHILOSOPHY OF JOHN DEWEY (1939)
THE PHILOSOPHY OF GEORGE SANTAYANA (1940)
THE PHILOSOPHY OF ALFRED NORTH WHITEHEAD (1941)
THE PHILOSOPHY OF G. E. MOORE (1942)
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BERTRAND RUSSELL (1944)
THE PHILOSOPHY OF ERNST CASSIRER (1949)
In Preparation:
ALBERT EINSTEIN: P H IL O S O P H E R- S C I E N TI ST
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BENEDETTO CROCE
THE PHILOSOPHY OF SARVEPALLI R AD H AKRI S H N AN
THE PHILOSOPHY OF KARL JASPERS
Other volumes to be announced later
THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
Volume VI
THE PHILOSOPHY
OF
ERNST CASSIRER
EDITED BY
PAUL ARTHUR SCHILPP
1949
THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS, INC.
THE PHILOSOPHY OF ERNST CASSIRER
Copyright, 1949, by The Library of Living Philosophers, Inc.
Printed in the United States of America
FIRST EDITION
A-F
GEORGE BANTA PUBLISHING COMPANY, MENASHA, WISCONSIN
GENERAL INTRODUCTrt>&
TO
"THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS"
A CCORDING to the late F. C. S. Schiller, the greatest ob-
JTj\. stacle to fruitful discussion in philosophy is "the curious
etiquette which apparently taboos the asking of questions about
a philosopher's meaning while he is alive." The "interminable
controversies which fill the histories of philosophy," he goes on
to say, "could have been ended at once by asking the living phi-
losophers a few searching questions."
The confident optimism of this last remark undoubtedly goes
too far. Living thinkers have often been asked "a few searching
questions," but their answers have not stopped "interminable
controversies" about their real meaning. It is none the less
true that there would be far greater clarity of understanding
than is now often the case, if more such searching questions had
been directed to great thinkers while they were still alive.
This, at any rate, is the basic thought behind the present un-
dertaking. The volumes of The Library of Living Philosophers
can in no sense take the place of the major writings of great
and original thinkers. Students who would know the philoso-
phies of such men as John Dewey, George Santayana, Alfred
North Whitehead, Benedetto Croce, G. E. Moore, Bertrand
Russell, Ernst Cassirer, Etienne Gilson, Karl Jaspers, et al.,
will still need to read the writings of these men. There
is no substitute for first-hand contact with the original thought
of the philosopher himself. Least of all does this Library pre-
tend to be such a substitute. The Library in fact will spare
neither effort nor expense in offering to the student the best
* This General Introduction, setting forth the underlying conception of this
Library, is purposely reprinted in each volume (with only very minor changes).
vii
viii THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
possible guide to the published writings of a given thinker. We
shall attempt to meet this aim by providing at the end of each
volume in our series a complete bibliography of the published
work of the philosopher in question. Nor should one overlook
the fact that the essays in each volume cannot but finally lead
to this same goal. The interpretative and critical discussions of
the various phases of a great thinker's work and, most of all,
the reply of the thinker himself, are bound to lead the reader
to the works of the philosopher himself.
At the same time, there is no blinking the fact that different
experts find different ideas in the writings of the same philoso-
pher. This is as true of the appreciative interpreter and grateful
disciple as it is of the critical opponent. Nor can it be denied
that such differences of reading and of interpretation on the
part of other experts often leave the neophyte aghast before
the whole maze of widely varying and even opposing interpreta-
tions. Who is right and whose interpretation shall he accept?
When the doctors disagree among themselves, what is the poor
student to do? If, finally, in desperation, he decides that all of
the interpreters are probably wrong and that the only thing for
him to do is to go back to the original writings of the philoso-
pher himself and then make his own decision uninfluenced (as
if this were possible!) by the interpretation of any one else
the result is not that he has actually come to the meaning of the
original philosopher himself, but rather that he has set up one
more interpretation, which may differ to a greater or lesser de-
gree from the interpretations already existing. It is clear that in
this direction lies chaos, just the kind of chaos which Schiller
has so graphically and inimitably described. 1
It is strange that until now no way of escaping this difficulty
has been seriously considered. It has not occurred to students of
philosophy that one effective way of meeting the problem at
least partially is to put these varying interpretations and critiques
before the philosopher while he is still alive and to ask him to
act at one and the same time as both defendant and judge. If
the world's great living philosophers can be induced to coSper-
*In his essay on "Must Philosophers Disagree?" in the volume by the same
title (Macmillan, London, 1934), from which the above quotations were taken.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION ix
ate in an enterprise whereby their own work can, at least to some
extent, be saved from becoming merely "desiccated lecture-
fodder," which on the one hand "provides innocuous sustenance
for ruminant professors," and, on the other hand, gives an op-
portunity to such ruminants and their understudies to "specu-
late safely, endlessly, and fruitlessly, about what a philosopher
must have meant" (Schiller), they will have taken a long step
toward making their intentions clearly comprehensible.
With this in mind The Library of Living Philosophers ex-
pects to publish at more or less regular intervals a volume on
each of the greater among the world's living philosophers. In
each case it will be the purpose of the editor of The Library
to bring together in the volume the interpretations and criti-
cisms of a wide range of that particular thinker's scholarly con-
temporaries, each of whom will be given a free hand to discuss
the specific phase of the thinker's work which has been assigned
to him. All contributed essays will finally be submitted to the
philosopher with whose work and thought they are concerned,
for his careful perusal and reply. And, although it would be ex-
pecting too much to imagine that the philosopher's reply will be
able to stop all differences of interpretation and of critique, this
should at least serve the purpose of stopping certain of the
grosser and more general kinds of misinterpretations. If no fur-
ther gain than this were to come from the present and projected
volumes of this Library, it would seem to be fully justified.
In carrying out this principal purpose of the Library, the
editor announces that (in so far as humanly possible) each vol-
ume will conform to the following pattern:
First, a series of expository and critical articles written by the
leading exponents and opponents of the philosopher's
thought;
Second, the reply to the critics and commentators by the phi-
losopher himself;
Third, an intellectual autobiography of the thinker whenever
this can be secured; in any case an authoritative and author-
ized biography; and
Fourth, a bibliography of the writings of the philosopher to pro-
x THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
vide a ready instrument to give access to his writings and
thought.
The editor has deemed it desirable to secure the services of
an Advisory Board of philosophers to aid him in the selection
of the subjects of future volumes. The names of the six promi-
nent American philosophers who have consented to serve appear
below. To each of them the editor expresses his deep-felt thanks.
The first fruit of their consultation is the selection of Karl Jaspers
as the subject of a subsequent study in this Library.
Future volumes in this series will appear in as rapid succes-
sion as is feasible in view of the scholarly nature of this Library.
The next volume in this series will be that on Albert Einstein:
Philosopher-Scientist, which is scheduled to come off the press
during 1949, the year which will mark Professor Einstein's
seventieth birthday.
PAUL ARTHUR SCHILPP
Editor
1 01 -i 02 FAYERWEATHER HALL
NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY
EVANSTON, ILLINOIS
ADVISORY BOARD
GEORGE P. ADAMS RICHARD P. McKEON
University of California University of Chicago
FRITZ KAUFMANN ARTHUR E. MURPHY
University of Buffalo Cornell University
CORNELIUS KRUSE HERBERT W. SCHNEIDER
American Council of Learned Columbia University
Societies
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. BIOGRAPHICAL MATERIAL
A. DIMITRY GAWRONSKY: "Ernst Cassirer: His Life and
His Work." i
B. Four Addresses, delivered at Memorial Services, held
under the Auspices of the Department of Philosophy of
Columbia University in the Brander Matthews Theater
of Columbia University, New York City, on June I,
1945 39
1. EDWARD CASE: "In Memoriam: Ernst Cassirer"
A poem 40
2. HAJO HOLBORN: "Ernst Cassirer" 41
3. F. SAXL: "Ernst Cassirer" 47
4. EDWARD CASE: "A Student's Nachruf" . . . . 52
5. CHARLES W. HENDEL: "Ernst Cassirer" ... 55
C. HENDRIK J. Pos: "Recollections of Ernst Cassirer" . 61
II. DESCRIPTIVE AND CRITICAL ESSAYS ON THE
PHILOSOPHY OF ERNST CASSIRER
1. HAMBURG, CARL H.: "Cassirer's Conception of Phi-
losophy" 73
2. SWABEY, WILLIAM CURTIS: "Cassirer and Meta-
physics" 121
3. STEPHENS, I. K.: "Cassirer's Doctrine of the A Prior?' 149
4. KAUFMANN, FELIX: "Cassirer's Theory of Scientific
Knowledge" 183
5. GAWRONSKY, DIMITRY: "Cassirer's Contribution to the
Epistemology of Physics" 215
6. SMART, HAROLD R.: "Cassirer's Theory of Mathe-
matical Concepts" 239
7.) LEWIN, KURT: "Cassirer's Philosophy of Science and
the Social Sciences" 269
8. HARTMAN, ROBERT S.: "Cassirer's Philosophy of Sym-
bolic Forms" 289
xi
xH TABLE OF CONTENTS
9. LEANDER, FOLKE: "Further Problems Suggested by the
Philosophy of Symbolic Forms" 335
10. MONTAGU, M. F. ASHLEY: "Cassirer on Mythological
Thinking" 359
11. LANCER, SUSANNE K.: "On Cassirer's Theory of Lan-
guage and Myth" 379
12. URBAN, WILBUR M.: "Cassirer's Philosophy of Lan-
guage" 401
13. GUTMANN, JAMES: "Cassirer's Humanism" . . . 443
14. SIDNEY, DAVID: "The Philosophical Anthropology of
Ernst Cassirer and Its Significance in Relation to
the History of Anthropological Thought" . . 465
15. KUHN, HELMUT: "Ernst Cassirer's Philosophy of
Culture" 545
1 6. BAUMGARDT, DAVID: "Cassirer and the Chaos in Mod-
ern Ethics" 575
17. GILBERT, KATHARINE: "Cassirer's Placement of Art" 605
1 8. SLOCHOWER, HARRY: "Ernst Cassirer's Functional Ap-
proach to Art and Literature" 631
1 9. REICHARDT, KONSTANTIN : "Ernst Cassirer's Contribu-
tion to Literary Criticism" 66 1
20. RANDALL, JOHN HERMAN, JR.: "Cassirer's Theory of
History as Illustrated in His Treatment of Renais-
sance Thought" 689
21. SOLMITZ, WALTER M.: "Cassirer on Galileo: An
Example of Cassirer's Way of Thought" . . . 729
22. WERKMEISTER, WILLIAM H.: "Cassirer's Advance
Beyond Neo-Kantianism" 757
23. KAUFMANN, FRITZ: "Cassirer, Neo-Kantianism, and
Phenomenology" 799
III. THE PHILOSOPHER SPEAKS FOR HIMSELF
ERNST CASSIRER: " 'Spirit' and 'Life' in Contemporary Phi-
losophy" 855
IV. BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE WRITINGS OF ERNST
CASSIRER (to 1946): Compiled by CARL H.
HAMBURG and WALTER M. SOLMITZ) . . . .881
Chronological List of Principal Works 910
Index (Arranged by ROBERT S. HARTMAN) 911
PREFACE
AS SOON as it had become clear that there was a real place
JTJIJL in philosophic literature for the type of book which it is
the aim of this Library to present, it was also quite evident that
such a series would not be complete without a volume on The
Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer. If there could ever have been any
doubt, on this point, it existed merely among such provincial
philosophical scholars as had not become personally acquainted,
let alone familiar, with the writings and work of this prodigious
and acute contemporary thinker. Anyone at all aware of Cas-
sirer's philosophical contributions, and of the ever growing in-
fluence of his thought upon younger thinkers, knew quite well
that Cassirer's philosophy would have to be treated in this
Library. It was not at all surprising, therefore, that the editor
found a ready response among scholars everywhere to his invita-
tion to contribute to a projected Cassirer volume. The present
co-operative effort, accordingly, had been largely planned long
before Professor Cassirer left the hospitable shores of Sweden
to come to the United States in 1942.
At the time, therefore, that the tragic news of Professor
Cassirer's unexpected death, on April 13, 1945, reached the
editor, many of the essays now appearing in this volume were
already in the editor's hands and many others had been in the
process of being written by their authors for some time past.
Nevertheless, this tragic blow among its manifold unhappy
consequences seemed to place a volume on the philosophy of
Ernst Cassirer in the Library of Living Philosophers forever
beyond the pale of possibility. For, with Cassirer dead, how
could a volume on his philosophy appear in such a series? This,
at any rate, was the first reaction of the editor to the unbe-
lievable news of Cassirer's passing. And it was in this spirit,
therefore, that letters went out almost immediately, notifying
anil
xiv THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
all contributors to the present book that, with the death of Cas-
sirer, the original project of a volume on his philosophy if
not actually completely abandoned would at least have to be
changed so radically as no longer to fit into the framework of
the Library.
The storm of protest and the almost unanimity of objection
which greeted this announcement forced, in the first place, a
careful reconsideration of the hasty decision, and very quickly
indeed, a complete reversal. Many of the contributors com-
plained that the editor was conceiving of the word "living" in
the title of the series far too literally or at least too narrowly.
That, despite the fact that we would now never be able to pre-
sent to the philosophical world either Cassirer's own auto-
biography or his formal "Reply" to his critics, it was perhaps
all the more necessary that the philosophical world should have
an opportunity to see and view this great contemporary thinker's
ideas from the varied points of view made possible precisely in
the kind of book which the volumes in this series have been.
Although it is true that the editor yielded to this almost uni-
versal pressure and even more to the force and decisiveness of
this argument, the yielding certainly did not take place in the
least reluctantly. Of course it is true that he greatly regrets
the anomaly of having a volume appear in a series dealing
with "living" philosophers, when the philosopher with whose
thought the volume is concerned is no longer among the physi-
cally living. But, on the other hand, he would not be truthful,
where he to claim that he feels that the present volume has
for these reasons no legitimate place within the bounds of
this particular series. After all, the volume on The Philosophy
of Alfred North Whitehead (Vol. Ill of this Library} also had
no formal "Reply" to the expository and critical articles in the
book from the pen of Whitehead and yet seemed to fill a
real philosophical need just the same. And, in the case of the
Whitehead volume, this problem was in a sense at least even
more serious than it would appear to be in the present instance.
For, when the Whitehead volume appeared in print, Professor
Whitehead himself was still very much alive even though he
had just gone through a terrible siege of double pneumonia at
PREFACE xv
the age of eighty. If, in Whitehead's case, we were prevented
from carrying out the fundamental idea of this series by the
commanding imperative of very serious illness, in the case of
Cassirer we found ourselves stopped at the point of "The
Philosopher's Reply" by the finality of death itself. But,
though death might prevent us from giving our readers the
very careful and minute formal "Reply," which the editor
knows Cassirer had planned to write for the present volume,
even that tragic fatality was not able to stop the continued
strong influence which Cassirer's thought is having upon serious
reflection in the contemporary world. Nor should it be allowed
to stop the present volume. For better or for worse, therefore,
the volume now is done or, more accurately speaking, is done
as much as it could be done once Cassirer himself was no longer
with us. And, frankly, though the reviewers almost inevitably
will pick on the anomaly of the appearance of this book under
the title of this series, after reading the material which has gone
into the making of this book, the editor himself does not at all
feel apologetic for its publication. For this volume will best
fulfill its real function in philosophical literature if like its
predecessors in this series it will send the reader of The Phi-
losophy of Ernst Cassirer to the books and other writings of
Cassirer himself, where he may learn by experience why he
would have been the loser, if he had never made the detailed
acquaintance of this acute philosophical mind and of the great
and profound contributions which that mind has made to the
thinking and knowing of man.
There is one temptation in the writing of this Preface to
which the editor dare not yield. It is all too tempting to discuss
Cassirer the philosopher; but this is done by twenty-three con-
temporary philosophers who have contributed to this volume
and most of whom are far better qualified for this task than is
the editor. It is even more tempting to trespass upon the good
taste of editorial prerogatives by discussing here Cassirer the
man, the gentleman, the personal friend. But to this temptation
also the editor must turn a deaf ear, since others, who have
known him much longer and far more intimately, have dis-
cussed this aspect within the covers of this book. I shall merely
xvi THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
say that I consider the personal acquaintance and contacts with
Ernst Cassirer to be among the greatest experiences and privi-
leges of my life. In the judgment of this writer, it is not too
much to say of Cassirer: Ecce Homo! It is profoundly sad to
contemplate his leaving us in the midst of his great creative and
productive career, with dozens of tasks which he had set him-
self unfinished and others barely begun.
The editor's debt of gratitude to each of the contributors to
this volume is so self-evident that a mere mention of this fact
should suffice. But, in view of the fact that many of them have
had to wait four years, or even longer, to see the arduous work
of their mind finally in print, the editor's debt, in this instance,
is even greater than usual. The reasons which have delayed the
appearance of this volume time and again are, however, far
too numerous to bear repetition here. Suffice it to record the
editor's sincere regrets and abject apologies for a situation which
has caused him much agony and ever increasing embarrassment,
but over much of which he had little (if any) control.
Special words of gratitude and appreciation need, however,
to be penned for the never failing helpfulness and encourage-
ment through all these three and one-half years since her illus-
trious husband's death given by the widow of Ernst Cassirer,
Mrs. Toni Cassirer. When at times the obstacles seemed almost
insurmountable, it was Mrs. Cassirer's everlasting faith which
kept the project going. Here truly is a woman who knew
and still knows her husband's greatness and who never failed
to understand the significance of what he was trying to do with
his life and thought.
Death did not spare the contributors to this volume either.
Two of these are no longer with us. First, Kurt Lewin, whose
essay for the present volume had been mailed to the editor
on January 3rd, 1947, passed away very suddenly only five
weeks later, namely on February nth, 1947. Thirteen months
later, in March 1948, the news of F. Saxl's death reached us.
The latter's contribution to this volume were remarks he de-
livered on the occasion of the Memorial Services held for Cas-
sirer at Columbia University. Little did he realize that, by the
time his remarks would appear in print, he himself would have
PREFACE xvii
joined those for whom it is altogether fitting to hold memorial
services. Of Kurt Lewin, Alexander M. Dashkin, writing in
Jewish Education (for Feb.-March issue, 1947), had the fol-
lowing to say: "Kurt Lewin was one of the very few men in our
midst who had the right to be called a genius. He was an inven-
tive, comprehensive mind, a warm large personality, with an
indefatigable capacity for resourceful work." The editor is proud
to be able to present, in this volume, what was undoubtedly one
of the last pieces of such creative work from the pen of Kurt
Lewin.
These lines are being written on the very eve of the editor's
departure for five months' sojourn in Europe, including a se-
mester's lecturing in one of Germany's newly re-opened univer-
sities. This means that the burden of proofreading and seeing
this volume through the press will largely have to fall upon
other shoulders. In the editor's absence he counts himself ex-
ceedingly fortunate in having been able to secure the able as-
sistance of his present colleague, old friend and former student,
Professor Robert W. Browning, of the department of philoso-
phy at Northwestern University. Upon Dr. Browning and such
additional aids as he is able to marshal, such, for example, as
that of Dr. David Bidney of the Viking Fund, New York City,
who has already kindly offered his good services because of his
deep interest in this project and his knowledge of the editor's
temporary absence , the detailed technical work of seeing this
volume to final fruition will largely devolve. To them the edi-
tor, as well as the contributors and readers, owe a deep and great
debt of gratitude, especially in view of the fact that all such
service on a project like this unsupported as it is by endow-
ments or by any university press can only be a labor of love.
The same goes for Professor Robert S. Hartman, of the De-
partment of Philosophy of Ohio State University, another one
of the editor's former students, who again was kind enough to
undertake the laborious task of preparing the index and of see-
ing it through the press. A brief look at the index will convince
even the casual observer of the immensity of this task and of
the consequent obligation under which the editor feels himself
to Dr. Hartman.
xviii THE LIBRARY OF LIVING PHILOSOPHERS
In conclusion the reader's attention must be called to the
deplorable fact that the main works by Cassirer have been out
of print for some time and are simply not to be had anywhere.
This situation should certainly be remedied as soon as at all
possible. New German editions of Cassirer's works are sorely
needed. But, if Cassirer is ever truly to come into his own in
the English speaking world, it is high time that some enterpris-
ing university press in this country should soon supply the phil-
osophical reading public with authorized translations into Eng-
lish of at least most of Cassirer 's major works. Certainly some
well-to-do reader of the present volume could do far worse
than offer his financial aid to such an enterprising university
press for the purpose of at least partial subsidies for such pub-
lication.
P. A. S.
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY
EVANSTON, ILLINOIS
August 3, 1948
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Grateful acknowledgement is made to the Yale University Press, to
the Open Court Publishing Company, to Harper and Brothers, and
to the Princeton University Press, for their kind permission to quote
at length from the works of Ernst Cassirer, without requiring a de-
tailed enumeration. Exact title, name of publisher, and place and date
of publication of each of Cassirer's works are enumerated in the Bibli-
ography to this volume, found on pages 885 to 909.
We also wish to express our appreciation to the editors and publishers
of the numerous philosophical and literary journals quoted, and to the
publishers of all other books used by our contributors, for the privilege
of utilizing source materials therein found relevant to the discussion of
The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer.
A
Dimitry Gawronsky
ERNST CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK
A Biography
ERNST CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK
ERNST CASSIRER was born in Breslau on July 28, 1874.
He was the fourth child of a rich Jewish tradesman j a
brother and two sisters preceded Ernst. His brother died in
infancy, before Ernst was born, and his mother therefore be-
stowed upon the second boy, the impassioned love she had felt
for her lost son and in memory of this tragic loss and the ordeal
she underwent she called her second son Ernst. To the last days
of her life, Ernst was her most cherished child, although two
other sons and three daughters came after him.
As a boy, Ernst was exceptionally cheerful and buoyant, yet
easy to handle. In his games he displayed an inexhaustible
imagination j he was full of new tricks and pranks, and nothing
in his nature seemed to reveal that his life would be devoted to
quiet and concentrated contemplation. He was endowed with a
great courage and, as a boy of ten, it was nothing to him to swim
the broad Oder River across and back. The most outstanding
feature of the boy was his keen sense of fair play and justice.
Althought the most beloved child of the family, he never toler-
ated the slightest discrimination against his brothers and sisters,
never accepted any favors, refused anything which was not also
given to the others.
Ernst was an impassioned music lover and never missed an
opportunity to attend a concert or an opera. In his early classes
at the "Gymnasium" he was just an average pupil, much more
likely to be at the bottom than at the head of his class. He kept
so busy playing with his brothers and friends that there was
little time left for study.
But a change was not far off. Ernst's maternal grandfather,
although a self-taught person, was an exceptionally cultured
man of wide intellectual scope and truly philosophical mind.
He lived not far from Breslau, and every summer Ernst paid a
4 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
visit to his grandfather. There, in conversations with his grand-
father, whom he dearly loved, and in the latter's vast library,
awoke and grew Ernst's interest in the problems of the intel-
lectual life. All his life Cassirer was convinced that he inherited
his philosophical vein of thought from his grandfather. At the
age of twelve he had already thoroughly read many literary
and historical works. Shakespeare, whose work he found in his
father's library, especially appealed to him and Ernst read and
reread all of Shakespeare's plays several times; only Hamlet
was missing from his father's library, and Ernst was quite un-
aware of the existence of this play. Then, on his thirteenth birth-
day, he received a book containing Shakespeare's complete
works and he was most amazed and thrilled to "discover" Ham-
let.
At this early age and for the remainder of his life
Cassirer acquired the capacity for concentrated and persistent
work. His entire behavior began to change slowly. Now there
was only little time left for play, and in his class he became
admittedly the best pupil. In higher classes Cassirer's teachers
were often amazed at the depth of his knowledge and maturity
of his judgment, and when he completed his studies at the
"Gymnasium" his graduation certificate contained the highest
marks.
Without losing any time, Cassirer entered the University of
Berlin. He was then eighteen years of age and the major sub-
ject he had selected for a study was jurisprudence. He made
this choice more upon the insistence of his father, who was
largely interested in the field of law, than of his own free will.
Soon he gave up this line of study and began to concentrate
upon German philosophy and literature. In addition he listened
eagerly to lectures on history and art. And yet all these studies
somehow did not give Cassirer complete satisfaction; something
was lacking in them; he missed in them a certain degree of
depth in understanding and failed to find any solution of funda-
mental problems. It was undoubtedly this sense of dissatisfac-
tion which caused Cassirer to change universities several times;
he went from Berlin to Leipzig, from there to Heidelberg, and
then back to Berlin. In the meantime he further enlarged the
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 5
scope of his studies and found himself becoming more and more
interested in philosophy. Thus it happened that in the summer
of 1894 he decided to take a course on Kant's philosophy given
by Georg Simmel, then a young and brilliant Privatdozent at
the University of Berlin.
This was a time when strong idealistic tendencies seemed to
win a decisive victory over mysticism, which for many centuries
had dominated German spiritual culture. Already in the first
half of the thirteenth century Meister Eckhart, one of the
greatest of the German mystics, had impressively revealed the
very core of his creed in the following words: "Man, yes, I
stood with God before time and the world were created; yes,
I was included in the eternal Godhead even before it became
God. Together with me God has created and is still and always
creating. Only through me He became God." This conception,
born out of titanic pride, infinite egotistic power, and ecstasy of
passion, for five long centuries and virtually unopposed had
dominated German spiritual culture; it never remained a move-
ment of intellectuals only, or of any other small group of peo-
ple; in fact, all the great folk movements in Germany during
those five centuries were movements of outspoken mysticism.
In the eighteenth century, however, tendencies of a very
different nature came to the fore within German culture. Leib-
niz and Wolf, Lessing and Goethe, Schiller and Kant created
in Germany a bright atmosphere of genuine humanism; ideal-
istic tendencies, intermingled with radical rationalism, became
most potent in Germany's intellectual life. Yet, this triumph of
reason and of humanism was only shortlived; with the begin-
ning of the nineteenth century a huge wave of mysticism again
arose in Germany, breaking through all ramparts of measure
and reason and overflowing the spiritual culture of Germany.
Then again, in the last third of the nineteenth century Otto
Liebmann and Hermann Cohen initiated a philosophical move-
ment which harked back to Kant and to the idealistic tendencies
of the eighteenth century. Several philosophical "schools" soon
arose in Germany, all quite similar in this basic tendency and
diverging from each other in only more or less important
details. When Ernst Cassirer began his academic studies, this
6 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
neo-Kantianism dominated many of the German universities
to an almost exclusive degree. Hans Vaihinger for a score of
years kept in his desk the completed volume of his Philosophy
of As lj y a fictional and pragmatistic conception of knowledge,
and wrote his commentary on Kant in which he embarked upon
an orthodox interpretation of Kant's texts, word by word and
sentence by sentence. And Simmel, the future leading "philoso-
pher of life," wrote and lectured on Kant's philosophy.
For some weeks Cassirer regularly attended Simmel's lec-
tures. Once, when lecturing on Kant, Simmel dropped the fol-
lowing remark: "Undoubtedly the best books on Kant are
written by Hermann Cohen; but I must confess that I do not
understand them."
Immediately after the lecture, Cassirer went to his bookshop
and ordered Cohen's books; and no sooner had he begun study-
ing them than his decision was made to go to Marburg and
there to study philosophy under Cohen's guidance. However,
Cassirer did not want to go to Cohen at once. The young stu-
dent studied Kant's and Cohen's works thoroughly, as well as
those of several other philosophers essential for the understand-
ing of Kant, such as Plato, Descartes, and Leibniz. In addition
he devoted a large part of his time to the study of mathematics,
mechanics, and biology sciences which were indispensable for
an understanding of Cohen's interpretation of Kant.
When, in the spring of 1896, Cassirer finally arrived in
Marburg to hear Cohen for the first time, he knew a great deal
about Kant's and Cohen's philosophies. There was something
very peculiar about Cohen's appearance: he was stout and short,
with an incredibly huge head towering over his broad shoulders.
He had an almost abnormally high forehead. His eyes flashed,
fascinated, and penetrated, despite the dark glasses which he
always wore. In his lectures and seminars, and even in his pri-
vate conversations, one could not help experiencing the presence
of a great mind and the heart of a prophet, filled to overflowing
with an ecstatic belief in the value of truth and the power of
goodness. No matter what problem Cohen discussed a mathe-
matical, epistemological or ethical one he always spoke with
a deep, intense passion, which was usually controlled perfectly
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 7
by the measured flow of his slow and powerful language until
the passion broke through in a few words or short sentences.
Then Cohen would shout with mighty voice at his listeners,
emphasizing the importance of his words with an energetic
movement of his hands.
However interesting Cohen's lectures were, his seminars
were even more stimulating. He was truly a spiritual "mid-
wife" in the Socratic sense. Always using the method of the
Socratic dialogue, he had a great pedagogical ability to let the
students themselves find the answers to questions discussed. His
patience and his personal interest in the intellectual develop-
ment of every single one of the students was inexhaustible. At
the same time he was keenly concerned with their general wel-
fare, and whenever his help was needed, he always gave it to
his utmost.
In the first seminar hour which Cassirer attended he volun-
teered to answer a rather difficult philosophical question asked
by Cohen. A conversation arose between them, and within a few
minutes Cohen was quite aware of the type of student that sat
before him. Later on this first meeting with Cassirer belonged
to Cohen's most pleasant reminiscences, and he enjoyed telling
it frequently and in great detail} how a new student, whom he
had never seen before, very youthful in appearance, a little shy
but determined, raised his hand and in a firm voice gave a quite
correct and complete answer to his question. "I felt at once,"
said Cohen, "that this man had nothing to learn from me." At
that time Cohen was surrounded by quite a few disciples, and
some of them already had studied philosophy with him for
years; but from the first moment Cassirer towered above them
all. He was quite at home in all the most intricate problems of
Kantian and Cohenian ways of thinking.
It was a firmly established custom in Marburg that after
every seminar Cohen's disciples, often five or six at a time,
accompanied him to the threshold of his house. But Cassirer,
who in every seminar distinguished himself by the scope of his
knowledge and by the brilliancy of his philosophical mind, at
first did not approach Cohen or his students. For years already
Cassirer had been entirely'absorbed in his studies and had little
8 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
time to spare for social intercourse; he did not enjoy any type
of discussion with his friends, probably because his own inten-
sive thinking furthered his intellectual progress even more. He
became almost unsociable. In this mood he came to Marburg;
he was always most polite and friendly to everybody, but kept
so obviously aloof that Cohen's disciples nicknamed him "the
Olympian." Most amazed of all was Cohen himself; he took a
great liking to Cassirer and keenly felt the latter's outstanding
philosophical talent; but he wondered at his strange behavior.
Finally Cohen developed a peculiar suspicion. There was one
group of people whom Cohen could not tolerate: the converted
Jews; he never even shook hands with them. Cohen evidently
thought that Cassirer was also converted and was avoiding any
personal contact with his teacher because he was aware of
Cohen's attitude towards such people. When Cassirer finally
heard of this surmise, he at once called on Cohen, and this was
the beginning of an intimate friendship between them which
lasted to the end of Cohen's days.
Now Cassirer became the acknowledged leader in the circle
of Cohen's disciples. He lived in a house which for decades
was a sort of headquarters for Cohen's students, and with
several of these students Cassirer came into close personal con-
tact. It was, however, still quite impossible to entice Cassirer to
go to a party or to spend an evening in a cafe, which was the
almost obligatory pastime of the German students; but he took
a fancy to studying with some of his new friends. Thus he read
Dante and Galileo with an Italian disciple of Cohen; he studied
intricate Greek texts with a classical philologist, and for hours
he discussed difficult mathematical problems with a mathema-
tician. And the most interesting part of it was that all these
people, although they were experts in their respective fields,
willingly acknowledged Cassirer's superiority and received
from him a great deal more than they were able to give him in
return. Soon all students of Cohen knew that, whenever they
needed a helping hand, they could turn to Cassirer, and this
very busy man who treasured every minute of his time was
always ready to spend hours explaining difficult problems to
anybody who approached him.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 9
By the end of Cassirer's first semester in Marburg not only
all the University, but all the town as well, knew of the prodigy.
Cassirer became quite popular, but he did not enjoy popularity
at all} he sincerely hated any kind of notoriety in connection
with his person.
Undoubtedly the credit for Cassirer's stupendous knowledge
must be attributed to a large degree to his exceptional memory.
Cohen told us several times that as a young student Cassirer was
able to quote by heart whole pages of almost all the classical
poets and philosophers. And, in a sorrowful voice, Cohen never
forgot to add: "Even all modern poets, like Nietzsche and
Stefan George, he could quote you by heart for hours!" This
prodigious memory served Cassirer faithfully to the end of his
days and made him capable of finding with the greatest of ease
any quotations he needed in all those countless books he had
read during his life time. Yet Cassirer's memory was not just a
passive capacity, a sort of storage for acquired knowledge it
was rather an er-mnern in Goethe's sense, a process of repeated
and creative mental absorption, combined with a keen ability
to see all essential elements of a problem and its organic relation
to other problems. Cassirer's sharp and most active intellect
constantly used the rich material of his memory, incessantly
reviewing and reshaping it under different aspects, thus keeping
it vividly present in his mind.
When Cassirer came to Cohen, the latter's philosophy was in
a state of transition. Cohen worked at that time on his own
system of philosophy, which he began publishing a few years
later. Cohen's chief goal at that time was to free Kant's philoso-
phy from inner contradiction and to emphasize more strongly
its fundamental methods and ideas. In his "critique of reason"
Kant tried to measure the real power of the human intellect
and the part it played in the cognition of the external world.
The result Kant reached was the following: the human intellect
not only classifies and combines our sensations and perceptions,
but does much more besides j it forms them from the outset and
makes them possible, so that even the simplest sensation exists
in the human mind owing to the analytical and synthetical
power of the human intellect which carries in itself visible marks
io DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
of this power. We are very much mistaken when we think that,
for instance, a "white ceiling' ' or a "brown floor" are just simple
sensations} quite the contrary is true: "white," "ceiling,"
"brown," "floor" presuppose already whole systems of concepts,
continuous application of analytical and synthetical functions of
our intellect. Any sensory intuition, Kant taught in the central
chapter of his Critique of Pure Reason, in the "Transcendental
Deduction of the Pure Concept of Reason," is only possible as a
product of the creative activity of the fundamental functions of
our intellect; yet in the chapters preceding and following this
one Kant insisted upon the necessity of accepting the sensory
intuition as the very source of the creative synthetic power of
our intellect. Furthermore, having showed the indispensability
of reason for the true understanding of nature, for the creation
of natural science as a thoroughly consistent system of knowl-
edge, Kant still did not part with his conception of the "thing-
in-itself," according to which all our knowledge has nothing
to do with the world of ultimate reality, but can only deal with
the sphere of humanly (i-e. y sensorily) conditioned appearances.
Thus Kant decisively broke with the naive and shallow belief
of the German Enlightenment in the miraculous power of the
intellect, with its tendency to solve with the help of trite and
schematic reasonings all mysteries of the cosmos; he put the
greatest stress upon the necessity of clear insight into the basic
limitations which characterize the creative work of human
reason. Yet all these limitations Kant accepted only for the
realm of theoretical knowledge, not for the field of ethical
activity; in this latter sphere Kant was convinced that the
knowledge of good as well as its materialization depend ex-
clusively on the human intellect, that all emotions and feelings
such as friendship, sympathy, love insofar as they are in-
strumental in the realization of good, only obscure and debase
the purity of moral principles.
Cohen tried to rectify these inconsistencies. To him "sensa-
tion" was only a problem which could be consciously put and
solved by the methods of the human intellect: this bright
yellow stain in the skies is in reality the centre of a whole
planetary system which reveals in its substance and movements
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 11
a miraculous chain of natural laws. This knowledge is genuine
and is directed towards the true object, behind which no "thing-
in-itself" is hidden. Yet, our knowledge is deficient and is able
to progress slowly and painfully 5 only as a result of the infinite
progress of science can a true knowledge of the object be won.
And only the completely exploded object, reached at the
infinitely remote limit of our knowledge, is the real "thing-in-
itself."
Thus, Cohen's philosophy decisively preached the predomi-
nant role of the intellect in the realm of knowledge and did
away with some of the basic limitations of intellectual power
which were accepted by Kant. Yet, it was quite different in the
realm of volition; there Cohen was much less rationalistic than
Kant and was convinced that it was the intensity of our emotions
and feelings on which depended the energy of our volition;
they supplied the "motor power" for our actions.
Hence came Cohen's preference for mathematics and natural
science; there the work of our intellect could be observed and
studied in its unadulterated form. And, since the intellect was to
Cohen the backbone of the human mind, he strongly insisted
upon the necessity of starting philosophical studies with epis-
temology. Cassirer knew this already from Cohen's books and
eagerly studied mathematics and natural science before he went
to Marburg. Now he devoted almost all of his time to these
disciplines and to the problems of knowledge.
During the first semester Cohen already began asking
Cassirer which subject he would like to choose for his doctor's
thesis. After some hesitation Cassirer decided to write on Leib-
niz. Many reasons determined this choice. First of all there was
the great versatility of Leibniz's prolific genius and his funda-
mental achievement in the fields of logic, mathematics, and
natural science, in which at that time Cassirer was primarily
interested. Next, the exceptional difficulty of the task also chal-
lenged Cassirer j Leibniz had set forth his philosophy not in
book form mainly, but piecemeal, in his vast correspondence;
and the system of his philosophy consequently had to be recon-
structed out of these dispersed elements. In addition, the slowly
developing recognition of Leibniz's great importance for the
12 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
development of modern philosophy caused the Berlin Academy
to make Leibniz the subject for a prize competition, and
Cassirer decided to participate in this competition.
In less than two years Cassirer had completed his sizable
work on Leibniz. The first part of it, dealing with Descartes'
theory of knowledge, was accepted by the Marburg philosophi-
cal faculty as a doctor's dissertation and obtained the highest
possible mark in form of the very seldom conferred "opus
eximum." Cassirer was at once admitted to the oral examination,
during which he once more kept his teachers breathless by the
immensity of his knowledge and brilliancy of his understand-
ing, and was awarded the doctor's degree "summa cum laude."
The entire book on Leibniz Cassirer presented to the Berlin
Academy. There he was not quite so fortunate: the Academy
decided not to give the first prize to anyone j Cassirer's book
obtained the second prize, followed by a long and most flatter-
ing commendation, where his great erudition, philosophical
talent and brilliancy of presentation were highly praised, but
the prevalence of rational and systematic tendencies, along with
the primary concentration upon the epistemological problems
were given as reasons for the withholding of the first prize from
him. Some 130 years before the Berlin Academy had made a
similar grave mistake, which world opinion had to correct in
subsequent years, by withholding the first prize from Immanuel
Kant. Did not that famous Academy commit a similar error in
Cassirer's case?
Upon receiving his Doctorate from Marburg University,
Cassirer went back to the home of his parents, who meanwhile
had moved to Berlin. There he at once began working on a new
problem, which grew out of his research on Leibniz he de-
cided to give a comprehensive picture of the development of
epistemology in the philosophy and science of modern times.
He continued to live in seclusion, devoting all his time to his
studies. Yet, his aloofness never was a matter of unsociability:
it was his vivid awareness of the greatness of the task he had
embarked upon, combined with the all-devouring interest in his
work, which forced him to spare to the limit his time and
energy.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 13
It was on the occasion of a close relative's wedding in Berlin,
in 1901, that Cassirer met his first cousin from Vienna. He had
previously seen her only once, eight years earlier, when she was
a child of nine. All artistic traits of Cassirer's nature, his love
and deep understanding of music, his fine feeling for genuine
beauty had in no way suffered from his assiduous scientific re-
searches and philosophical meditations; they always added a
great deal to the irresistible charm of his personality and were
immediately and deeply felt by the young girl. This first meet-
ing determined their whole future. They fell in love with each
other and married a year later in Vienna.
This was indeed an exceptionally happy and harmonious
union. Their mutual understanding was perfect, and Cassirer's
wife always succeeded, thanks to her remarkable understanding
and insight, in creating for her husband, even during the most
stormy periods of their life, appropriate conditions for his con-
tinuous work.
Immediately after the wedding the young couple went to
Munich, where they lived for more than a year. It was during
this year that their first son, Heinz, was born (he is now mem-
ber of the philosophical faculty at the University of Glasgow,
Scotland). In 1903 Cassirer returned with his family to Berlin,
where he began writing his history of epistemology. Cohen
constantly pressed upon him and urged him to embark upon
an academic career, yet Cassirer showed little desire to go to
some small university town and live there for years in its at-
mosphere of gossip and latent anti-Semitism. He much pre-
ferred to stay in Berlin, where most of his and his wife's
relatives lived and where the treasure of the State and Uni-
versity libraries were at his disposal. His work developed
rapidly, and as early as 1904 the two volumes of his
Erkenntnisfroblem ("Problem of Knowledge") were finished.
It was one of Cohen's most cherished stories how once, while
visiting Cassirer in Berlin in 1904, he had asked Cassirer how
his work was progressing. "Without saying a word," Cohen
would relate, "Cassirer led me into his study, opened a drawer
of his desk, and there it was, a voluminous, completely finished
manuscript of his new work."
14 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
In 1906 the first volume of the Erkenntnis-problem ("Prob-
lem of Knowledge") was published, followed by the second
one in 1908. The outstanding qualities of this work were
rapidly recognized by students of philosophy all over the
world} it appeared in several editions and slowly became one of
the standard works on the history of human thought. Cassirer's
original intention had been to give a broad picture of modern
European thought as it led to, and culminated in, the philoso-
phy of Kant. This he did in the first two volumes of his
Erkenntnis'problem. Fifteen years later he added one more
volume, in which he set forth the development of epistemology
in post-Kantian philosophy; and shortly before he came to
America (in the summer of 1941) he finished the as yet un-
published fourth volume, where he has given a broad picture
of the evolution of epistemology up to our own days.*
The more one studies this work of Cassirer, the more one
admires the intellectual scope of the man who was able to write
it. Immense was the number of books Cassirer had to study and
familiarize himself with in the interest of this work. And yet,
this is the least spectacular part of it. Really amazing is
Cassirer's ability to penetrate scores of individual systems of
thought, reconstruct them in all their peculiarities, accentuate
all that is original and fruitful in them, and reveal all their
weaknesses and inconsistencies. Cassirer had an incredibly fine
mind for the slightest nuances of thought, for the minutest
differences and similarities, for all that was of fundamental or
of secondary importance; with steady grasp he picked up the
development through all its stages and ramifications; and, in
showing how the same concept acquired a different meaning,
according to the diverse philosophical systems in which it was
applied as a constructive element, Cassirer laid the first founda-
tion for the ideas which he later developed as his theory of
"symbolic forms." Scores of Italian and German, French and
English philosophers, almost or completely fallen into oblivion,
came back in Cassirer's book to new life and historical impor-
* EDITOR'S NOTE: This (fourth) volume of Cassirer's Erkennlnis'problem is
now being translated into English under the direction of Professor Charles W.
Hendel and will in due time be published by the Yale University Press.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 15
tance as organic links in the development of ideas or as con-
nections between well known philosophical systems} thus mak-
ing the continuity of philosophical thought more consistent and
true. He was the first to introduce into the history of philosophy
such names as Kepler, Galileo, Huygens, Newton, and Euler,
by giving a detailed analysis of their philosophical conceptions,
scientific methods and achievements, and by proving their
fundamental importance for the theory of knowledge. Kant's
own assertion that he tried to introduce Newton's method into
philosophy now became quite clear in Cassirer's representation
of Newton's and Kant's systems of thought. Yet Cassirer's
greatest achievement in this work consisted in the creation of a
broad general background by connecting the evolution of
knowledge with the totality of spiritual culture: mythos and
religion, psychology and metaphysics, ethics and aesthetics
Cassirer drew all these problems into his deliberations as soon as
he found some links missing in the development of their
epistemology.
Most noteworthy is also the style and the whole manner of
presentation in this work. The most intricate philosophical prob-
lems are treated in a quite clear and simple way; one gets the
impression that the author deeply felt his responsibility to truth
and to the reader; in every sentence he sincerely tried to help
the reader to advance on the thorny path of truth. Cassirer's
style makes any subject he discusses almost transparent, and
his argumentation glides along like a broad and mighty stream,
with great convincing power.
The great success of his Erkenntnisproblem, which became
obvious immediately after the appearance of the first volume,
caused Cassirer to yield to Cohen's ardent desire and to embark
finally upon an academic career. Yet, there was one condition
attached to it he was ready to become Privatdozent only in the
University of Berlin, since he still did not want to leave the
city. He knew how difficult this undertaking was, first, because
he was a Jew, and secondly, because he was Cohen's disciple and
considered himself a member of the Marburg school, which
at that time was one of the most renowned and hated
"schools" in Germany. In his quiet manner Cassirer said to
1 6 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
Cohen: "In this way I do not risk anything. I need not go any-
where and waste my time. And if they do not want me it is all
right with me."
At that time philosophy was by no means brilliantly repre-
sented at the University of Berlin. The famous Dilthey was
already retired and only occasionally gave a few lectures for a
selected group of students. Simmel was still there, but owing
to his Jewish lineage and notwithstanding the importance of
his books (especially his voluminous Soziologie, which became
a standard work of pre-Hitlerite German science) and the
brilliant success of his lectures, he was an assistant professor and
virtually without any influence. The leading roles were played
by Stumpf and Riehl, both quite serious scholars, but without
any real importance (the following untranslatable pun was then
very popular with the students at the University of Berlin:
"Philosophic wird in Berlin mit Stumpf und Riehl aus-
gerottet"). Stumpf was bitterly opposed to any form of idealis-
tic philosophy ; Riehl tried to interpret Kant in a realistic sense
and was an outspoken antagonist of the Marburg "school." Yet
it was precisely these two men that Cassirer had to deal with
when he decided to become Privatdozent of the University of
Berlin.
According to the regulations valid at that time in the Uni-
versity of Berlin a candidate for "Privatdozentur" had to pre-
sent a scientific study in the form of a book or manuscript
and then, if his study had been accepted, he was invited to a so-
called colloquium, where he had to give a trial lecture and to
answer questions or critical comments on views expressed by
him. Cassirer sent in his Erkenntnisproblem, which was at once
accepted. A few weeks later he was invited to the colloquium,
and as subject for his trial lecture he had chosen the "Ding an
sichy" one of the most intricate concepts of Kant's philosophy. In
his Erkenntmsfwoblem Cassirer had given a very interesting
interpretation of this notion: he showed that the "Ding an
sich y " being within Kant's philosophy always a limit of a
maximum or minimum value, radically changed its meaning
according to the particular group or system of concepts with
reference to which in any given case it played the role of the
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 17
limit. Thus, the "Ding an s\ch" has one meaning in the
"Transcendentale Aesthetik" (Part I of Kritik der reinen
Vernunft^y and an essentially different meaning in the "Deduc-
tion der reinen Verstandesbegriffe" (Part II of the same work),
and it is, therefore, fruitless to define this notion without taking
into consideration the peculiar nature of the specific ideas with
which it is connected in any special case.
Here again we can vividly feel the future originator of the
theory of "symbolic forms." Yet, Stumpf and Riehl were, of
course, not satisfied at all, and they both, especially the latter,
violently attacked Cassirer's theory. "You deny the existence of
real things surrounding us," said Riehl. "Look at that oven
there in the corner: to me it is a real thing, which gives us heat
and can burn our skin; but to you it is just a mental image, a
fiction!" Time and again Cassirer tried to explain the true
meaning of the Kantian criticism, that human reason creates our
knowledge of things, but not the things themselves; yet with-
out avail. When the colloquium was over, both Stumpf and
Riehl pleaded against admitting Cassirer as Privatdozent. But
Dilthey, who was also present at the colloquium, decisively
took Cassirer J s side and finished his plea with these words: "I
would not like to be a man of whom posterity will say that he
rejected Cassirer." This was sufficient to turn the tide: without
further discussion the faculty gave Cassirer the venia legendi.
In subsequent years the writer of this biography came to
Berlin many times and frequently had the opportunity of at-
tending Cassirer's lectures. Thus he was able to observe
Cassirer's rapidly growing popularity; he saw how the original
attendance of a few students grew to several dozens, then to
many scores. This was an outstanding success; for at that time
Cassirer's lectures were not obligatory for anyone, and his class-
room was, therefore, crowded only because the students felt
that what they got from him was true and substantial knowl-
edge. Besides, his delivery was most attractive, his speech was
very vivid and fluent, exact and eloquent at the same time.
Especially popular were Cassirer J s seminars; there, in close
personal contact with his students, he displayed all the charm
and benevolence of his nature, he analyzed with endless patience
1 8 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
and sympathetic understanding any expressed opinion and, if
necessary, cautiously corrected it or interpreted it in the most
fruitful possible way. He was a true paidagogos in the Platonic
sense, deeply convinced that the teacher is largely to blame for
the insufficiencies of his pupil.
However, when circumstances demanded it, Cassirer could
show that he was a real master of fencing. Once it was in
Berlin, in 1910 our common friend persuaded us to attend a
lecture of a disciple of Avenarius. The lecture was quite con-
fused and Cassirer was quite irritated by the lack of knowledge
and understanding shown by the speaker. During the discussion,
Cassirer took the floor and in the short space of less than half an
hour he not merely revealed his amazingly deep and exact
knowledge of Avenarius, but he uncovered so brilliantly all the
inconsistencies of the main speaker that the entire lecture
seemed literally to dissolve into thin air before our very eyes.
When he finished, the audience cheered and laughed and went
home without even listening to the lecturer's attempted stam-
mering rejoinder. Much more important, however, was another
occasion where Cassirer displayed his qualifications as a brilliant
polemicist. It was when Leonard Nelson, the founder of the
so-called New-Friesian "school," violently attacked Hermann
Cohen. Here again it was the unfairness of the criticism, the
lack of understanding or any desire for true understanding
which induced Cassirer to answer Nelson. A polemic developed
which could have become very interesting, if the opponents had
been equal in intellectual stature. As things were, Cassirer
towered above his antagonist to such a degree that all the time
they fought on different levels: Nelson tried to ridicule single
sentences, taken out of Cohen's books, especially of his Logik
der reinen Erkenntnis, which is a profound and creative work
but a hard nut to crack} whereas Cassirer was mainly interested
in the very roots of the dissension and tried to show, by analyz-
ing the original Kant-Fries relationship, the dangers of an ex-
aggerated psychologism for epistemology.
The first great systematic work of Cassirer appeared in 1910,
his Stibstanzbegrif und Funktionsbegrif. Despite the origi-
nality of the basic conception and whole structure of this work
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 19
or, maybe just because of this , it was several years before
the importance of this work was duly recognized by the scien-
tific world and by the philosophically interested public. Then,
however, it became the first work of Cassirer to be translated
into several foreign languages, including English and Russian,
As the title of the book indicates, it is devoted to the problem
of concepts. (Although in the title of the authorized English
translation, viz., Substance and Function, this fact is almost lost
sight of.) For more than two thousand years the science of logic
was based upon Aristotle's doctrine of concepts, which says
that generalization is always the result of abstraction: from a
group of similar things, for instance, round, oval, square,
rectangular tables the attributes common to them all are ab-
stracted and summarized in a general concept, "table." This
theory, Cassirer argues, has one decisive weakness: whence and
how do we get those groups of similar things that we allegedly
use as the basis for our abstractions? How does it happen that
from one perception, say that of a round table, we proceed to
other perceptions which are similar to the first one and not to
the perceptions of, for instance, "auto," "star," "water," in
which case we would not obtain a group of similar things? Is it
not obvious that we use the first perception as a kind of criterion
with the help of which we are able to decide what belongs to
our group of similar things and what not? Thus Aristotle's
abstraction becomes only possible as the result of a selec-
tion, of the coordinated activity of the human reason, which is
the first and fundamental step toward general notions. "What
lends the theory of abstraction support is merely the circum-
stance that it does not presuppose the contents, out of which
the concept is to develop, as disconnected particularities, but that
it tacitly thinks them in the form of an ordered manifold from
the first. The concept, however, is not deduced thereby, but
presupposed; for, when we ascribe to a manifold an order and
connection of elements, we have already presupposed the con-
cept, if not in its complete form, yet in its fundamental func-
tion." 1
Thus Aristotle's theory of concept, based upon the abstraction
1 Ernst Cassirer, Substance and Function. Chicago London, 1923, p. 17.
20 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
of common elements from a group of similar things, is nothing
else than an obvious circulus viciosus. Yet this is not all. The
theory of abstraction shows also another decisive weakness: in
order to form a concept only such attributes are retained which
are common to all elements of a given group, whereas all
particularities are not included in a general concept they are
just thrown aside and fade away. And the more general a con-
cept is, the less attributes it contains, the more particularities
disappear in the process of abstraction. Yet, "the genuine con-
cept does not disregard the peculiarities and particularities which
it holds under it, but seeks to show the necessity of the occurrence
and connection of just these particularities. . . . Here the more
universal concept shows itself also the more rich in content." 2
Scientific concepts are all of this kind} they are general ideas,
but their true function consists of expressing the rule from which
a number of concrete particular forms can be derived.
In his Substance and Function Cassirer also undertook the
difficult task of showing what particular kinds of concepts
underly the different realms of the exact and natural sciences,
what is the logical essence of such categories as number, space,
time, energy, and so forth. Cassirer was particularly interested
in the problem of how the structure of concepts changes its
character when we pass from one field of science to another j
for instance, from mathematics to physics, or from physics to
biology, etc. In carrying out this plan, he made, for the first
time in the history of human thought, the very important and
successful attempt to give a systematic analysis of concepts
which underly the science of chemistry. The last part of the
book is devoted to the theory of knowledge proper, to the con-
cepts and methods by which human reason transforms sensory
impressions into the systems of objective science.
The members of the Marburg school were very proud of this
new performance of Cassirer. Yet, the opposition came this time
from a quarter from which it had been least expected from
Hermann Cohen himself. Already while reading the proofs,
Cohen obtained the impression, that as he expressed it later
in a letter to Cassirer "our unity was jeopardized." Especially
pp. 19-20.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 21
one long paragraph in Cassirer's book seemed to Cohen to be
quite inconsistent with the teachings of the Marburg school,
and, although all of Cohen's closest disciples were convinced
that Cohen was mistaken, Cassirer, who invariably held Cohen
in deepest respect, at once decided to reshape the whole page,
despite the fact that he did not agree with Cohen and that his
book was already in the final stages of printing. Upon reading
the finished book, Cohen wrote to Cassirer: "I congratulate you
and all members of our philosophical community on your new
and great achievement. If I shall not be able to write the second
part of my Logic, no harm will be done to our common cause,
since my project is to a large degree fulfilled in your book." 3
But the criticism comes after that: "Yet, after my first reading
of your book I still cannot discard as wrong what I told you in
Marburg: you put the center of gravity upon the concept of
relation and you believe that you have accomplished with the
help of this concept the idealization of all materiality. The ex-
pression even escaped you, that the concept of relation is a
category; yet it is a category only insofar as it is function, and
function unavoidably demands the infinitesimal element in
which alone the root of the ideal reality can be found."
The controversy goes back to Cohen's daring attempt to
establish the infinitesimal numbers as an absolute element, to
put this absolute element before the whole number and to de-
rive the latter from the former. There can be little doubt,
logically as well as mathematically, that this is an impossible
undertaking; the value of a number depends always on its
relation to other numbers in which it may be contemplated:
five is only fiye in relation to one, yet it is an infinite number in
relation to an infinitesimal one, and an infinitesimal number in
relation to an infinite one. Cassirer's "function," as contrasted
with "substance," meant just that: it is impossible to ascribe an
absolute value to a mathematical element, since this value is
determined by different relations to which it may belong.
Cassirer's theory of concept proved its great fruitfulness for
the whole field of theoretical knowledge; it freed the principles
and methods of human reason from the shadow of absoluteness
3 From Cohen's letter to Cassirer of August 24, 1910.
22 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
and disclosed their functional nature as flexible instruments of
human knowledge. And just as the functional concept contains
a direction, a certain point of view which serves as a basis of
measurement for the similarity of single elements and arranges
them in groups and series according to their affinity, so "the
ideal connections spoken of by logic and mathematics are the
permanent lines of direction, by which experience is orientated
in its scientific shaping. The function of these connections is their
permanent and indestructible value, and is verified as identical
through all changes in the accidental material of experience." 4
The publication of this important work brought about no
change in Cassirer's academic career j he was still Privatdozent
in Berlin, and not one single German university invited him,
even as an assistant professor. Every time a chair in philosophy
became free, Cassirer was invariably listed by the respective
faculty as a candidate, but, oddly enough, his name was always
put in the second place. Cassirer himself was quite content with
his limited academic activities in the University of Berlin ; he
not only never complained, but he did not even seem to feel the
unfairness of the situation. He enjoyed his life and work in
Berlin, his great success as teacher and scholar, even though
officially it remained unrecognized.
Harvard University was the first to invite him, in 1914, for
two years as visiting professor. However, personal reasons pre-
vented Cassirer at that time from accepting this invitation. The
same year he was awarded the Kuno Fischer Gold Medal by the
Heidelberg Academy. Upon Cassirer's special request he was
given a bronze medal instead, and the difference in monetary
value 3,000 R.M. was sent to the Red Cross.
Although Cassirer was highly absorbed by his research work
and academic activities, he still found time to organize and
direct a new edition of Kant's works. For this edition he wrote
an extensive biographical and philosophical introduction to
Kant's system. In this introduction he gives a very clear both
popular and truly scientific picture of the evolution of Kant's
central ideas and makes several important contributions to the
understanding of Kant's philosophy. Perhaps the most important
4 Op. cit., p. 323.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 23
of these contributions is Cassirer's analysis of the fundamental
ideas of Kant's Kritik der Urteilskrajt and his explanation of
why Kant based his theory of judgment upon two seemingly
so different roots as the philosophy of art, on the one hand, and
biology, on the other.
Thus far all of Cassirer's publications had been devoted to
the problem of knowledge. Although he was vitally interested
in all the problems of art, ethics, and religion, and assiduously
worked on them, he somehow did not feel ready to write down
the results of his research; and meanwhile he was busy with the
preparations for the third volume of his Erkewntws'problem.
The outbreak of the First World War changed his plans. He
was drafted for Civil Service, and his work consisted of the
reading of foreign newspapers. Thus he was able to contemplate
the war from different points of view and to obtain a truer
picture of events j he knew already in the early stages of the
war that Germany was doomed. Besides, his whole nature was
absolutely contrary to the imperialistic megalomania of Prus-
sian militarism. Yet he was a philosopher, not a politician, and
he found his own way of expressing his attitude toward the
ultimate spiritual values around which the struggle raged: he
published his book Freiheit und Form.
All truly humanitarian and idealistic tendencies of German
culture, everything which proclaimed the dignity and freedom
of individuals and of nations Leasing and Schiller, Kant and
Goethe was convincingly and eloquently expounded by Cas-
sirer in this book, providing a magnificent picture of man's
struggle for his spiritual liberation, showing Lessing's cosmo-
politanism and sublime tolerance, Schiller's keen sensitiveness
and passion for freedom, Kant's radical, conception of natural
right, and Goethe's redemption of the individual as milestones
of this eternal process.
Cassirer showed in this book that his feeling for all forms of
poetry was just as deep and incisive as his understanding of
science. His interpretation of Goethe's lyrics, his analysis of
Goethe's poetical work in the different stages of its develop-
ment belong to the best that has ever been written on this sub-
ject. Cassirer's strong artistic vein enabled him to grasp the
24 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
inner core of Goethe's symbols, to provide those symbols with
profound and most surprising interpretation. "Mahomed,"
"Pandora" to mention only two examples in Cassirer's
masterly exposition appeared suddenly in a new light and their
unfathomable wisdom and beauty became visible to anyone. No
less penetrating was his analysis of Goethe's achievements in the
fields of aesthetics, morals, and religion. Cassirer always felt
keenly that great poets and belletrists were, in their innermost,
endeavoring to find a solution to the eternal problems of being
and life, akin to the search of the great philosophers} they only
expressed their thoughts and beliefs in the form of concrete
symbols and images, and not in the form of abstract reasoning.
Goethe's titanic personality, the originality, depth and versa-
tility of his creative power irresistibly attracted Cassirer all his
life, and in a long series of special articles he followed up his
study of Goethe. Brilliant was the way in which he revealed the
deepest ideological roots of Goethe's polemic attitude towards
Newton, or described Goethe's conception of history, or com-
pared the spiritual worlds of Goethe and Plato. All who knew
Cassirer personally admitted that his face reminded them of
Goethe^ yet their mental similarity was even more striking it
was the same wide scope of spiritual interests, the same tend-
ency to regard every event in the light of endless historical
perspectives, to transform every single fact into an element of
an infinite system. It was undoubtedly this affinity of mental
tendencies which accounted for Cassirer's unique understanding
of Goethe
War nicht das Auge sonnenhaft,
Die Sonne Konnt' es nie erblicken. . . .
World War I brought a deep spiritual crisis in Europe. One
belief especially had been shattered to its very foundation: the
idea that human reason was a decisive power in the social life
of man. When, at the beginning of the twentieth century,
Georges Sorel advanced his theory that not reason but social
myth was the driving power of human history, that the actions
of human societies were determined not by objective truth and
cool deliberation but by peculiar images, mostly born out of
hatred, revulsion, contempt, and filled with strong impulses and
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 25
emotions, images, which have nothing to do with truth and
often represent the greatest possible falsehood the scholars
only laughed at him and paid no attention at all to his "queer"
ideas. Yet, the progress of the war and the subsequent years
which saw the birth of several totalitarian ideologies and their
victorious march to power in the largest countries of Europe,
ruined and disarrayed by the war, clearly showed the extent
of truth contained in Sorel's social theories. The stormy pace of
historical events demanded a new approach to the problems of
reality, different ways and means for its understanding. This
was the background for Cassirer's theory of symbolic forms
his great contribution to the understanding of the most vital
problems of our time and of history.
When the author of this article again met Cassirer, shortly
after the termination of World War I, Cassirer was already
quite absorbed in his new work. Cassirer once told how in 1917,
just as he entered a street car to ride home, the conception of the
symbolic forms flashed upon him 5 a few minutes later, when he
reached his home, the whole plan of his new voluminous work
was ready in his mind, in essentially the form in which it was
carried out in the course of the subsequent ten years. Suddenly
the onesidedness of the Kant-Cohen theory of knowledge be-
came quite clear to Cassirer. It is not true that only the human
reason opens the door which leads to the understanding of
reality, it is rather the whole of the human mind, with all its
functions and impulses, all its potencies of imagination, feeling,
volition, and logical thinking which builds the bridge between
man's soul and reality, which determines and moulds our con-
ception of reality. "The true concept of reality cannot be pressed
into a plain and abstract form of being, it rather contains the
whole manifold and wealth of spiritual life. ... In this sense
any new 'symbolic form' not only the concept and system of
knowledge, but also the intuitive world of art or myth or langu-
age, represents according to a saying of Goethe's a revela-
tion directed from the inside toward the outside, a 'synthesis of
world and mind,' which alone makes certain for us the genuine
unity of both." 5 The whole world of reality can be grasped
5 Ernst Cassirer, Phttosofhie der symbolischen Formen. Vol. I, p. 46.
26 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
only with the help of certain mental images, symbolic forms,
and the task of philosophy consists in the understanding of those
mental and psychical functions which determine the structure
of these symbolic forms. A queer image of primitive totemism
may be vastly different from the modern conception of four-
dimentional space, yet they both show a definite regularity of
inward structure, they both can be reduced to some fundamental
functions of the human mind. Even the spiritual world of
lunatics reveals to an attentive analysis some definite regularities
which find their expression in queer but still understandable
symbolic forms and their study proved to be helpful for the
diagnosis and treatment of certain mental diseases.
The whole of human culture is reflected in our mind in an
endless row of symbolic forms, and Cassirer now embarked
upon the titanic task of first trying to analyze the structure of
these forms in general, and, secondly, to show what special kind
of symbolic forms underlie the different realms of human life
religion, art, science, social activities. For many years the
external conditions of his life were greatly favorable to this
immense task: during World War I two new universities were
founded in Germany, one in Hamburg and the other in Frank-
furt, both quite progressive and democratic, and the first thing
they both did was to offer Cassirer a full professorship in
philosophy. Cassirer decided to accept the offer of the Uni-
versity of Hamburg because it showed an exceptionally great
eagerness for securing his services. He never regretted his
choice in Hamburg he found everything he could desire: a
large and most interested audience for his lectures, and the
famous private "Warburg Library" with a rich collection of
materials which Cassirer needed for his researches into symbolic
forms. Many times Cassirer expressed his positive amazement
at the fact that the selection of the materials and the whole in-
ward structure of this library suggested the idea that its
founder must have more or less anticipated his theory of
symbolic forms as a system of fundamental functions of the
human mind underlying all basic tendencies of human culture
and explaining the particular nature of any one of them.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 27
In the years 1923-1929 the three volumes of his Philosophie
der symbolischen Formen were composed and published. Based
upon vast historical and systematical material, the work gives
a penetrating analysis of Cassirer's general theory of symbolic
forms and of its application to the problems of language, of
myths, and of knowledge. Almost incredible is the wealth of
concrete facts and original ideas by means of which Cassirer shows
the fruitfulness of his theory. Almost the entire world's litera-
ture on language and myths, almost all the realms of human
science had been closely explored by him and the particular
kinds of symbolic forms in those different realms shown in bold
and broad relief. Yet, even this immense job did not take all of
Cassirer's time and energy. During the same years, while work-
ing out and writing down his Philoso'phie der symbolischen
Formen y he finished the third volume of his Erkenntnityrob-
lem y he wrote a book on Einstein's theory of relativity and pub-
lished literally scores of philosophical and literary articles. Be-
sides, he eagerly performed his duties as academic teacher, gave
weekly several lectures and seminars, and was most accessible
to any student who desired his help on philosophical problems.
Despite this immense amount of intellectual work which
Cassirer performed day after day, there was nothing of the
ivory tower pedant in him; he spent almost every evening in the
circle of his family and of his friends, and he showed a lively
interest in all world-events. It was amazing to what a degree he
was able to keep abreast of so many things which had no relation
whatsoever to his scientific work he was a thorough connois-
seur of classical music, and in the classical operas he knew not
only every single melody, but also every word of the text, often
even in several different languages. He knew a great deal about
many fields of sport and was able to discuss some intricate prob-
lems of passiance or skat. He was even interested in the most
impersonal manner in stock exchange prices and tried to
understand what was hidden behind their seemingly grotesque
and unpredictable movements. Yet, there was only one game
which he really cherished: chess. Only on rare occasions did he
have the time and opportunity to play a game of chess or to
28 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
analyze the game of an outstanding master; but when he did
take the time for such it absorbed him to such a degree that as
long as he busied himself with chess he did not hear or see any-
thing that was going on around him.
This great versatility proved to be a real blessing to Cassirer
when, in 1930, he was elected rector of the University of Ham-
burg. Now he had to represent the University at the various
academic functions and to make speeches on literally every type
of subject one day he spoke on the development of modern
traffic, another day on the breeding of hogs, then again on the
importance of athletic sports. And the most amazing part of it
was that the scope of his understanding and the wealth of his
knowledge were so vast that whatever subject he touched upon
he was able to illuminate its different aspects and to show its
true place in the whole of cultural life.
Fourteen most prolific years of his life Cassirer spent in
Hamburg; into this period fell also two large research works
on the history of philosophy, one concerning the time of the
Reformation, the other dealing with the development of Plato-
nism in England. This latter work, published in 1932, was the
last one he ever published in Germany. Meanwhile heavy
storm clouds darkened the skies over Germany, the Hitler
movement was on the verge of its first decisive victory, ready
to take over the Reich government. Already years before Cas-
sirer had recognized the great danger of this movement; he
never listened to the speeches of Hitler or his henchmen, he
never read their books and pamphlets; yet he seemed to know
with uncanny foresight what Nazism was about to do to
Germany and to the rest of the world. When their notorious
slogan: "Right is what serves our Fuehrer" first came up, and
Cassirer heard of it, he said: "This is the end of Germany."
Cassirer, therefore, did not wait to be dismissed by the Nazis
he tendered his resignation immediately after Hitler became
Chancellor of the German Reich. He knew that there would be
nothing for him to do in the "new" Germany, and he decided
to emigrate. Within a very few weeks he was offered three pro-
fessorships in three different countries one in Sweden (Upsala
University), one in England (Oxford University), and one in
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 29
the U.S. A. (New School for Social Research in New York). Cas-
sirer went first to Oxford, where he lectured for two years
(1933-35). When he arrived in England, he was only able to
read English, but he could not speak a word of it. Yet, three
months later he was already lecturing in English. Meanwhile
he had received another offer, this time from the University of
Goeteborg (Sweden). He decided to accept it, but only on one
condition: that he would be given a personal chair, in order that
no Swedish professor would have to lose his job. This condition
was readily accepted, and, in September, 1935, Cassirer went to
Goeteborg.
He stayed in Sweden for almost six years 5 and those years
again were very fruitful years for him. In 1937 he published
his book on Determinismus und Indeterminismus in der mod-
ernen Physik. Cassirer himself regarded this book as one of his
most important achievements. His capacity to penetrate into all
the details of the most intricate problems of modern physics,
as shown by this book, is truly amazing. Cassirer had been
prompted to embark upon this difficult task by a prolonged and
somewhat confused discussion which had arisen among several
leading physicists and which had touched upon the funda-
mental problems of epistemology, especially upon the principle
of causality. The structure of the atom, the peculiar manner in
which an electric particle jumps, as it were, from one pre-
destined trajectory to another, the difficulties in recognizing
and characterizing individual elements, and the necessity of
applying statistical methods to the solution of quantum-theo-
retical problems convinced many physicists not only of the im-
possibility of going on exclusively with the methods of the
so-called classical mechanics but even induced some of them to
discard the principle of causality altogether and to introduce
the concept of purpose into the interpretation of purely material
phenomena. In order to analyze this problem, Cassirer gave
a vast and detailed picture of the development of the basic
concepts of mechanics and physics in modern times; he showed
the historical continuity of thought, which led to the conception
of the quantum theory, and convincingly demonstrated that it
was not the principle of causality which was to blame for the
30 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
difficulties with which this theory had to struggle, but the fact
that the system of symbols used in it was too narrow: modern
physics "is confronted with the necessity of applying different
types of symbols, of schematic 'explanation/ to one and the
same occurrence." 6
This idea, in which Cassirer saw a consistent method of
interpretation of the fundamental results of atomic physics, is
one of the basic principles of his philosophy of symbolic forms.
He once expressed it in a simple, yet truly classical, manner
with the aid of the following concrete example: "We begin with
a certain perceptual experience: with a drawing which we see
before us. We may turn our attention, first of all, to the purely
sensory 'impression' which we comprehend as a simple combina-
tion of lines." Now we change our approach to this geometrical
figure, we apply to it another set of symbolic forms, and "the
spatial image becomes an aesthetic one: I comprehend in it the
character of a certain ornament, with which there is connected
in my mind a certain artistic sense and significance. . . . And once
again the form of my contemplation may change, insofar as that
which at first appeared to me as a pure ornament now reveals
itself as the bearer of a mystic-religious significance." 7 Thus the
same thing, in this particular case a geometrical figure, appears,
when treated from different points of view, as the bearer of a
very different significance, as a concept with different meanings.
No sooner had Cassirer finished his epistemological interpre-
tation of the quantum theory than he began working on the
fourth volume of the Erkenntnisfroblem. In this volume,
which is now awaiting publication, Cassirer is giving us an
integral analysis of the development of epistemological and
logical problems for the period of the last hundred years
from the middle of the nineteenth century to practically our
own day. This volume also contains a critical analysis of all
important movements in the realm of contemporary philosophy.
* Determinismus , p. 265.
f From "Das Symbolproblem und seine Stellung im System der Philosophic" in
the Zeitschrtft fur Aesthetik und Allgemeine KunstwitsenscJiaft, Vol. 21, pp. 194-
195. Both of the above quotations come from this article j the translation is by
the present writer.
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 31
There were two more books Cassirer published during the
six years he lived in Sweden, both of them very typical of his
almost incredible versatility and mental adaptability. For, de-
spite his advanced age, he mastered the Swedish language
perfectly and so thoroughly imbued himself with Swedish art,
philosophy, literature, and history that he was able to make a
very important contribution to the development of Swedish
philosophy with his book on Hagerstrom. Cassirer's second
book is devoted to Descartes and his relation to the Swedish
queen Christine} here he discusses one of the most difficult
problems of Swedish history: why did Queen Christine resign
her throne? Cassirer attempts his solution of this problem by
spreading new light upon Descartes, on his influence upon
Christine, and by giving a broad picture of the spiritual life of
Europe in the seventeenth century.
When Cassirer left Germany he arranged everything for the
emigration of his daughter and two sons. One son and the
daughter joined him almost immediately in England. But it
took all of five years before his second son could join him in
Goeteborg. This was a great sorrow of the emigration years
he was never able to live together with all his children and
grandchildren, whom he loved so dearly j there was always a
separation from one or the other.
In the summer of 1941 Cassirer accepted the invitation of
Yale University and came to the United States as a visiting
professor. His original intention was to remain here two years
only and then to return to Sweden, where he had, in the mean-
time, become a citizen. However, the outbreak of World War
II upset his plans. At the end of two years he was unable to
return to Sweden and willingly agreed, therefore, to prolong
his contract with Yale University for another year. During this
period Cassirer received an invitation to teach at Columbia
University and in the summer of 1944, he left New Haven and
went to New York.
His arrival in America opened a new page in Cassirer's life.
Here again one has to admire his great adaptability. This time
it was not the English language, which he knew quite well by
now, nor was it American philosophy the development of which
32 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
he had studied closely for decades. In Substance and Function
one already finds numerous references to American scholars
and philosophers. But the methods of academic teaching in
America are quite different from those of Europe. The co-
operation between students and professors is much closer and
more informal here than in Europe. Cassirer not only adapted
himself willingly and easily to these different ways of teaching
he sincerely liked and greatly appreciated them. He often
said that to work together with a group of eager students who
recognized no other authority than truth itself and kept ques-
tioning their teachers until they were entirely and thoroughly
satisfied was to him a new and most fruitful experience.
During the last twelve years of his life Cassirer devoted in-
creasingly more time to research in the fields of the social
sciences. He felt that now the time had come for him to apply
his philosophy of symbolic forms to this realm of human culture
which had always strongly attracted him, but which he had never
yet discussed systematically in his books. There had been good
reasons for this delay. The social sciences cannot easily free
themselves from the influence of deeply rooted subjective
tendencies in the form of national and class ideologies, religious
and racial prejudices, economic interests, etc. Cassirer undertook
to explore in the first instance those aspects of human culture
where the attitude of (at least relative) objectivity could more
easily prevail. But the victorious advance of the totalitarian
ideology in some of the largest countries of Europe finally
urged him on to take a stand against these destructive forces
which as was so obvious to him threatened to engulf the
whole world. In 1941 he wrote, therefore, his first more
comprehensive study in the field of the social sciences. Even
this, however, dealt, in the main, with the epistemological side
of the problem, with the characteristics of the particular
methods and principles upon which this branch of human
knowledge is based.
His Essay on Man, published in 1944, and written by him
in English, contains a comprehensive and integral exposition
of his philosophy of symbolic forms and their application to
different realms of human culture. In this book Cassirer not
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 33
only summarizes his more than half-a-century long researches
on languages and science, myth and religion, but he also shows,
for the first time, at some length the decisive role the symbolic
forms play in the realms of art and historical science. At the
same time Cassirer also published several important articles on
various subjects. In one of them he gave a quite original analysis
of the Bible and showed why the Nazis had chosen the Jews
as their ideological enemy Number One while the Nazis
based their power upon historical and social myths, the Jews
have always shown little inclination for mythical thought.
Meanwhile he also persistently worked on what he now con-
sidered to be his main task, namely, an undertaking of the
driving forces of human history, especially those forces which
made possible the appalling growth of totalitarianism in our
time. In 1944 he finally put into finished form a voluminous
manuscript which offers his solution to this problem. This book
which was to be Cassirer's last is entitled The Myth of the
State y and was written in English. Even if this were the only
book ever written by him, it would still secure a considerable
name for him as a scientist and philosopher for many genera-
tions to come. This book begins with an exhaustive analysis of
mythical thought, uncovering the intellectual, emotional, and
volitional roots upon which the myth thrives in the social life of
man. Then it gives a broad and general delineation, quite
original in nature, of the development of political theory from
the days of the early Greek philosophy to the very threshold of
our own time, and uncovers, step by step, the technique not
always clever, but always treacherous and persistent of the
modern political myth which led human culture to the brink of
complete destruction. The result of this penetrating and il-
luminating investigation into the myth of the state is found,
in concentrated form, in Cassirer's following words:
"In the Babylonian mythology we find a legend that de-
scribed the creation of the world. We are told that Marduk, the
highest God, before he could begin his work, had to fight a
dreadful combat. He had to vanquish and subjugate the serpent
Tiamat and the other dragons of darkness. He slew Tiamat and
bound the dragons. Out of the limbs of the monster Tiamat he
34 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
formed the world and gave to it its shape and its order. . . . The
world of human culture may be described in the words of this
Babylonian legend. It could not arise before the darkness of
myth was fought and overcome. But the mythical monsters
were not entirely destroyed. They were used for the creation
of a new universe and they still survive in this universe. The
powers of myth were thus checked and subdued by superior
forces. As long as these forces intellectual, ethical, artistic
forces are in full strength, myth is tamed and subdued. But
once they begin to lose their strength chaos arises again. Myth-
ical thought then begins to rise anew and to pervade the whole
of man's cultural and social life."*
Despite his advancing age, Cassirer kept on working continu-
ously, persistently, almost as much as he had worked in his
youth, and, in fact, throughout his life. How often did he sit,
writing at his desk, till late into the night, and the next morning
the first rays of the rising sun found him again busy with his
work. On April 13 (1945), the day of his death, Cassirer got
up very early and spent the whole morning at his desk writing;
then he went to Columbia University, never to return to his
home.
Ernst Cassirer belongs to the great tradition of classical phi-
losophy. Goethe, trying to define the essence of classicism, once
said: "Classicism is sanity, romanticism is illness," and Novalis,
one of the greatest among the romanticists, unwittingly pro-
vided the key to this judgment by his assertion that the essence
of romanticism consists in the transformation of a single event
or individual fact into an absolute and general principle of the
whole. To Novalis and Schlegel everything was the emotion of
love, even mathematics or a death sentence; to Fichte and
Schopenhauer everything was volition, just as to Hegel every-
thing was Objective Mind or to Schelling intellectual intuition:
in each case one principle, one function, one special power
dominates and determines the whole. Classicism, on the con-
trary, always recognizes several principles as quite independent
* EDITOR'S NOTE: Apparently Mr. Gawronsky, in making this quotation, had
access to a manuscript version of the book} cf. pp. 297-98 of the published work,
New Haven (1946).
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 35
of each other, although closely connected and organically
related and capable only in their organic interrelatedness of
creating and forming the spiritual world of man. This was the
very core of Cassirer's philosophical conviction. Throughout
the multifarious realms of human culture he demonstrated the
originality and independence of their respective symbolic forms
and at the same time showed the closest connection to exist
among all these forms, thus uniting them into one organic and
harmonic whole. So great, moreover, was the scope of Cas-
sirer's mental gifts, so inexhaustible his energy, so faithful his
memory, so deep, swift, and versatile his power of comprehen-
sion, his mind so original and imaginative, that he was able
to undertake a unique voyage around the entire spiritual world
of man and to discover, on his journey, innumerable treasures
of human thought.
Cassirer liked to tell the following story: once he met the
great mathematician Hilbert, the "Euclid of our time," and
asked him about one of the latter's disciples. Hilbert answered:
"He is all right. You know, for a mathematician he did not have
enough imagination. But he has become a poet and now he is
doing fine." Cassirer always heartily laughed, when he told
this story, and he had good reason for doing so, but a reason, of
which he was never aware: he had enough imagination to be-
come a true scholar and philosopher. His mental associations
were amazingly rich, colorful, and always quite exact. He
possessed in high degree the gift which Goethe called "im-
agination for the truth of reality" or "exact sensory imagina-
tion." However keen and daring his thinking was it always
remained measured, objective, realistic.
Truly original and prolific thinkers are usually very modest.
Goethe wrote in the introduction to his absolutely new and
revolutionary conception of botany that, in this work, he had not
said anything which any man of common sense could not easily
discover for himself. Kant frankly expressed his regret that he
was not as gifted as Mendelssohn. And we all know how ab-
solutely modest is Einstein. Thus, modesty was also one of
Cassirer's most outstanding traits. He never claimed that this or
that idea or conception had first been discovered or formulated
36 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
by him. On the contrary, he was always in the habit of quoting
numerous authorities both of the past and in the present who
expressed similar ideas} and he always pointed out that really
important ideas usually appear as the result of the close co-
operation of many human minds. Goethe's assertion that only
mankind as a whole is able to find the truth was part of Cas-
sirer's very nature and made him largely oblivious to the
uniqueness of many of his own deepest insights and significant
contributions.
It was this trait of Cassirer's mental attitude which made him
so tolerant in all spiritual things and so appreciative of all earnest
and sincere striving. His deep conviction that truth is im-
mensely beyond the insight of any one individual mind never
permitted him to discard any opinion without thorough investi-
gation. And, just because he found so much truth in other
thinkers, he never attempted to found a philosophical school of
his own. And it was precisely his great love of truth which made
deliberate falsehood and evil all the more loathsome to him.
Throughout his life, therefore, he did not stop fighting against
falsehood and evil in his own quiet but determined manner.
Cassirer was a deeply religious man. He cared little for
differing rites, rituals, confessions, or denominations} these
only split mankind into so many groups and often turn them
against each other. Yet the very core of any true religion, the
cosmic feeling, a love as wide as the universe and as intense as
the light of the sun, was always vivid in his heart. It was this
feeling which urged Cassirer incessantly to explore all material
and spiritual things, which filled his heart with deep sympathy
for everything good'in the world, which strengthened his will
to fight for this good. And it was this feeling which was the
source of his charming humour the Infinite All was always
present in his mind, it never permitted him to take either him-
self or his surroundings too seriously, and he was, therefore,
able to joke for hours in the most spirited and sympathetic
manner.
To the very end of his life Cassirer retained his youthful
spirit, his vivid interest in all the aspects of life around him and
his readiness to be helpful to other people. It is difficult to
CASSIRER: HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK 37
imagine a kinder and more sympathetic person, a man with such
an absolute devotion to the good. Symbolic of his whole nature,
therefore, was the way of his passing: on the street he was met
by one of his students, who addressed a question to him. Cas-
sirer turned to answer, smiled kindly at the young man, and
suddenly fell dead into his arms.
DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
NEW YORK CITY
B
FOUR ADDRESSES
Delivered at Memorial Services, held under the Auspices
of the
Department of Philosophy
of
Columbia University
Brander Matthews Theater, Columbia University
June i, 1945
IN MEMORIAM: ERNST CASSIRER
This is the locust season of our days
When the ripe meadows of the mind are bare,
This is the month of the never-born maize
Upon whose golden meats we shall not fare.
This is the week of the stunted stalk
And fruit that is dust on the bones of rock,
This is the day of the hungry hawk
And the songbirds dead by the fallen flock.
This is the noon of our derelict plain,
The sun-parched hour of most desolate pain.
Yet there is a valley where sweet grain grows
In strong-rooted stands, in tall splendid rows.
Here toiled in the meadows a man wise and serene,
And the meadows bore fruit and the meadows are green.
EDWARD MURRAY CASE
ERNST CASSIRER
WITH the passing of Ernst Cassirer one of the great
philosophical interpreters of human civilization has been
taken from us. The last true scion of the classic tradition of
German idealism has been laid to rest. While we are wondering
whether the Germans will ever be able to produce a new moral
and intellectual order by returning to the liberal humanism of
their own past, which they renounced so violently in recent
decades, this meeting is a demonstration of our confident faith
in these ideas as a precious part of our own culture.
Soon after the classic school of German philosophy had been
deprived of its great creative leaders with the deaths of Hegel
and Schelling, German philosophy lost its dominant position to
the new natural and historical sciences. Simultaneously Ger-
man philosophy began to retreat from an active participation in
the discussion of the fundamental political issues of the age. The
programs of the political parties were little affected by the
humane philosophy of the early part of the century.
In the last third of the century, however, a renascence of
philosophical thought took place, which is usually called the
rise of neo-Kantianism. But though a great deal of the new
philosophical discussion centered around a fresh study and
appreciation of Kant, the new philosophical movement did not
aim at the enthronement of the Konigsberg philosopher as the
patron saint of a new scholasticism but had much broader and
deeper objectives. It sprang from the moral and intellectual
dissatisfaction with the then fashionable ideas which seemed
incapable of overcoming the growing materialism and natural-
ism. Many went even so far as to consider these philosophies
the logical outcome of modern scientific research. In contrast,
.41
42 HAJO HOLBORN
the new generation of German philosophers asserted that the
progress of the individual natural and historical sciences
stemmed very largely from the discoveries of classic philosophy
and that research would lose its direction and meaning without
a critical awareness of its basic methods. However, philosophy
was not only to act as a guide to the various academic depart-
ments but was to gain fresh vigor from them.
Ernst Cassirer began his studies when the new philosophical
movement had already gained influence in German universities.
Lotze was probably the chief bridge-builder between the classic
idealism and the neo-idealism which then found its leaders
in Dilthey and in the neo-Kantian schools of Marburg and
the South- West, represented by Cohen and Natorp and by
Windelband and Rickert. But it should not be forgotten that
the sciences and arts took an active part in producing the new
philosophy. German mathematics and physics from Helmholtz
to Planck and Einstein were deeply conscious of their philo-
sophical roots and not all the historians got lost in contemporary
national politics. Harnack and his school of ecclesiastical his-
tory, the school of the history of religion from which Troeltsch
made his way into philosophy, and Meinecke's work in the
history of ideas are only a few examples of the manner in
which historians helped to buttress the new philosophical move-
ment.
Ernst Cassirer took his place among the best scholars of this
group, and while he remained always grateful for being the
member of a group of common spirit and purpose, he soon
began to chart a course of his own in accordance with his
personal gifts. In his early studies Cassirer concentrated on
achieving a fuller understanding of the much-praised and little-
known Leibniz, the real founder of the German philosophical
tradition. Leibniz was the father of the theory of knowledge
which, in contrast to almost the whole philosophy of the i8th
century, Kant included, saw in the study of nature and of history
two manifestations of the one human quest for knowledge. He
did not consider the humanities a lower, or less mature, form of
academic achievement. Both were branches of Wissenschaft,
science, i.e., both were producing scientific truth though by dif-
ERNST CASSIRER 43
ferent methods. Throughout his life Cassirer remained a stu-
dent of Leibniz by keeping abreast both of the progress of
the natural sciences and of the liberal arts.
However, Cassirer believed that his basic approach to phi-
losophy was Kantian in origin, Kant had maintained that the
way to a transcendental order could be gained only through
an analysis of the forms and methods of human thought, and
he had demonstrated the power of his new critical idealism in
the philosophical study of the natural sciences, ethics, and
finally aesthetics. The neo-Kantians and particularly Cassirer
went farther. Their epistemology included the methodology
of history and moreover of all forms of creative civilization,
finally encompassing even the expressions of pre-scientific hu-
man thought and imagination as revealed in language and
mythology.
This is the key to the truly universal scope of Cassirer's
studies. In addition to Leibniz and Kant, it was the spirit of
Goethe which gave life to Cassirer's thought,
Wer nicht von 3000 Jahren
Sich weiss Rechenschaft zu geben
Bleibt im Grunde unerfahren
Muss von Tag zu Tage leben. 1
In Cassirer's personality and work Goethe's program of edu-
cation became a living reality again. The totality of Western
civilization was to be reconstructed and made a part of the
consciousness of the modern individual and of present-day
civilization. The study of the processes and creations of civiliza-
tion would lift the individual to a position from which he could
see farther than "from day to day" and could begin to grasp
the ideal forms and categories of the human mind.
In this version of idealistic philosophy philosophical studies
became in large sections identical with historical research. In
general, Cassirer confined his historical interest to the history
of human thinking and avoided the discussion of the social and
political forces. However, he was not satisfied with the old-
l Tr.: He who cannot account for 3000 years is basically inexperienced and
therefore can only exist from day to day.
44 HAJO HOLBORN
fashioned type of history of philosophy which dealt chiefly
with the doctrines of the leading philosophers, and linked them
together by a loose chain of abstract speculation. Thus, between
a social and political interpretation of historical civilization on
one side and a history of mere ideas on the other his history of
human thought held its own place. His work ranged from the
tedious editing of small texts and discoveries to his monu-
mental edition of Kant. Beyond the editing it proceeded to the
analytical and interpretative monographs and articles covering
ancient science and the philosophy of practically all ages of
Western civilization. Even those historians who care little about
philosophy cannot by-pass the new historical vistas which he
opened particularly on the Renaissance and the European
Enlightenment.
But as closely as his historical and philosophical studies were
intertwined, the unity of his many interests is to be found in
the philosophical conviction that man can participate in a
higher order of life only through the realization of the peren-
nial forms of human thought. He drew these philosophical con-
clusions most clearly in his great Erkenntnistheorie and in his
Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen. Cassirer's writings mir-
ror far more than do those of most of his German colleagues
his unusual gift as a teacher. He had a unique facility for clear
and logical exposition, and all the products of his pen display
his extraordinary sense of balance and aesthetic form. His ca-
pacity to project himself into the psychological and mental
environment of a past age or of an individual thinker of the
past did not make him forget the individual needs of a present-
day audience or student. His understanding of human nature
made him take his listeners or pupils as seriously as the
philosophical and historical subjects he tried to expound to
them. These qualities explain his success as a teacher in Ger-
many, in Sweden, and in America.
Cassirer gave up his professorship in Hamburg when the
Hitlerites came to power in Germany. This was natural, con-
sidering that he was one of the chief exponents of that liberal
tradition of German thought which the Nazis tried to destroy
by all means. But, being at the same time a Jew, he had to
ERNST CASSIRER 45
take refuge in foreign countries. No German was as deeply
steeped in the German cultural tradition and very few had
contributed so much to its growth within his generation as
Ernst Cassirer. Many other German scholars who found them-
selves in a similar situation preferred to cut all their ties with
their Jewish origin. Prior to Hitler not very many Germans
would have criticized anyone for doing just that; on the con-
trary, many would have applauded such an attitude. Actually,
Cassirer's unwillingness to abandon his Jewish faith proved a
handicap in his earlier academic career, but he was too honest
to dissimulate his heritage. He was also conscious that a great
deal of his moral integrity and intellectual strength had come
to him through his Jewish culture. Nor did this make him feel
suspicious or bitter. There was little of Heinrich Heine in him,
but much more of Felix Mendelssohn, to whom he can be
compared in many respects. As Mendelssohn helped to dis-
cover for the Germans some of the greatest treasures of their
cultural past, and at the same time contributed by his own
creative work to the continuation of their classic tradition, so
did Cassirer in the philosophic field.
Yet Cassirer's life and work do not belong to Germany
alone. The philosophical revival of the last third of the nine-
teenth century was not merely a German event. It had its
parallels and found its students in many lands, e.g., in the
Italy of Benedetto Croce and to a lesser, though considerable,
degree in modern French philosophy or in the Spain of Ortega
y Gassett, from where it recently has spread far over Latin
America. Among his German contemporaries, Cassirer was
probably the one most conscious of the international significance
of philosophy. Certainly he was the one German philosopher
of distinction who had least indulged in construing the Kantian
and post-Kantian German philosophy as a complete refutation
of the philosophy of Western European Enlightenment. While
German philosophers and historians were prone to describe
the Kantian philosophy as a separation of the superior German
from Western-European civilization, Cassirer was always mind-
ful of the fact that Kant had his roots in the Western European
Enlightenment, or for that matter, that it was impossible to
4S HAJO HOLBORN
think of Goethe without Shaftesbury and Spinoza. These were
some of the reasons which made him approach Western-
European thought with the same warmth of understanding
which he showed in his German studies. He deserved the re-
spect and affection of the philosophers of other countries which
they showed him so often. Never did scholars of so many lands
cooperate in expressing their admiration for a colleague of theirs
as happened in the symposium on History and Philosophy,
which the Oxford Press presented to him at his 6oth birthday.
His knowledge of other civilizations, his truly cosmopolitan
outlook, and the friendships which he acquired among his
American colleagues and students, made the years of his exile
not only bearable, but fruitful. Others of his age never again
came into their own after being separated from the world in
which they had spent the major part of their life. No doubt
the events cast a tragic shadow over the last years of his career,
but they did not change his fundamental beliefs, nor even his
joy in research and teaching. The core of his personality was
unaffected. He was unassuming and undemanding. His greatest
satisfaction lay in giving others knowledge and wisdom.
HAJO HOLBORN
YALE UNIVERSITY
3
ERNST CASSIRER
IT MUST have been in 1920 that I first met Ernst Cassirer.
Although the war had been lost by Germany, the air was
full of hope. The collapse of material power had produced a
strong and favourable reaction in the intellectual field, and
one of the symptoms of this was the foundation, in Hamburg
now more anti-militaristic than ever of a new university. High
hopes were entertained for the new institution, which was to
be of good standing and to form an intellectual centre for the
Hansa city. Of particular importance was the chair of philoso-
phy, for which Cassirer had been chosen. The new university
elected a man whose international reputation at that time was
far greater than the recognition which the older seats of learn-
ing had bestowed on him. He lent a peculiar dignity to the
young arts faculty, and an ever-growing number of students
came to his courses, eager for the truth and for learning, after
the many deceptions of the war years.
On a day memorable in the annals of the Warburg Institute,
Cassirer came to see the library collected by Professor Warburg
over a period of about thirty years. Warburg's nerves had
broken down in 1920 under the strain of the post-war events,
and he had been sent to Switzerland for recovery. Being in
charge of the library, I showed Cassirer around. He was a
gracious visitor, who listened attentively as I explained to him
Warburg's intentions in placing books on philosophy next to
books on astrology, magic, and folklore, and in linking the sec-
tions on art with those on literature, religion, and philosophy.
The study of philosophy was for Warburg inseparable from
that of the so-called primitive mind: neither could be isolated
from the study of imagery in religion, literature, and art. These
47
48 F. SAXL
ideas had found expression in the unorthodox arrangement of
the books on the shelves.
Cassirer understood at once. Yet, when he was ready to
leave, he said, in the kind and clear manner so typical of him:
"This library is dangerous. I shall either have to avoid it alto-
gether or imprison myself here for years. The philosophical
problems involved are close to my own, but the concrete his-
torical material which Warburg has collected is overwhelming."
Thus he left me bewildered. In one hour this man had under-
stood more of the essential ideas embodied in that library than
anybody I had met before. Why, then, did he seem to hesitate?
I expected that, if anyone, he would help me with the difficult
task of continuing the library without its founder. But it seems
that the workings of his mind would not allow him or, at
least, not yet allow him to be drawn into the dangerous chan-
nels of Warburg's creation. Only much later did I understand
that the reason was not narrowness, but self-restraint. Those
who knew Cassirer will realize that the decision to keep aloof
from certain problems at a certain moment was dictated by
the austere logic of his own method.
But, after an interval of waiting, the situation changed
radically; and, from that moment on, for ten years, I never
appealed in vain to Cassirer for collaboration. He had begun
writing the first volume of his Philoso^hie der symbollschen
Formen and, in developing his systematic ideas, he studied the
voluminous concrete material prepared by ethnologists and
historians. Warburg had collected the very material which
Cassirer needed. More than that: looking back now it seems
miraculous that Warburg had collected it for thirty years with
a view to the very problems which Cassirer was then beginning
to investigate. In the 1890*8 (inspired by Friedrich Theodor
Vischer), Warburg had set out to study symbolic expression
in art. His experience in studying the rites and arts of the
New Mexico Zunis had taught him that the study of symbolic
expression in art could not be isolated from that of religion,
magic, language, and science. (In a number of still unpublished
writings, Warburg had, on the one hand, tried to formulate
a practical theory of the symbol in the history of civilization;
ERNST CASSIRER 49
while, on the other hand, he had built up a library containing the
concrete materials for these studies, beginning with books and
articles on the general problem of symbolic expression and
arranging all the historical sections with a view to this problem.)
At the time of Cassirer's first visit, Die Philosofhie der sym-
bolischen Formen was just taking shape in Cassirer J s mind. It
came as a shock to him, therefore, to see that a man whom he
hardly knew had covered the same ground, not in writings, but
in a complicated library system, which an attentive and specula-
tive visitor could spontaneously grasp. That was the reason why,
at our first meeting, Cassirer immediately felt that the alterna-
tive confronting him was either to ignore the Institute or else
to submit to its spell.
When the time was ripe for him, Cassirer became our most
assiduous reader. And the first book ever published by the Insti-
tute was from Cassirer's pen. It dealt with the problem on which
Warburg had started, namely to establish the categories of
primitive thought in the primitive cultures proper, as well as in
modern primitivism, as for example in astrology.
Warburg was a man of a very imaginative and emotional
type, in whom historical imagination, nourished by concrete
historical experience, always struggled against an ardent de-
sire for philosophical simplification. Yet he had created a tool
which a master, whose greatest gifts were in the line of systema-
tization, could use, and who, just at this moment, was eager
to find the concrete material on which to build his system.
Cassirer found it laid out in the library of a man who was still
alive, but who was living in darkness behind doors which
seemed never again to open for him.
Years went by. The first volume of Cassirer's magnum opts
appeared, while we published some corollaries to it and some
lectures. One day Cassirer went to Switzerland to pay a visit
to Warburg. It was a meeting of which both Cassirer and
Warburg often spoke in later years. The patient had prepared
himself for this day for weeks and months previously. Cassirer
came, full of sympathy and with the apprehension and awe that
mental illness inspires. In the years of anguish and isolation
Warburg's thought, which had never been arrested by the ill-
50 F. SAXL
ness, had centred around Kepler. Warburg had come to the
conclusion, although separated from all books, that modern
thought was born when Kepler broke the traditional supremacy
of the circle, as the ideal form in cosmological thought, and
replaced it by the ellipse. Cassirer, who never took notes but
possessed a memory of almost unlimited capacity, at once came
to Warburg's aid, giving chapter and verse for this idea by
quoting from Kepler. It was, probably, Warburg's first ray
of light in those dark years. He learnt through Cassirer that
he had not wandered in a pathless wilderness, but that his
scientific thought at least was sane. Cassirer's memory was
always miraculous} but it had never worked as miraculous a
cure as it did on that day.
In later years, when Warburg was back in Hamburg, a warm
friendship sprang up between the two men. Warburg admired
the clarity of thought and form in the philosopher; and Cassirer
was impressed by the man who grasped life and history with
such passion and who had gone through mental experiences
which gave every utterance of his about art or religion, about
philosophy and literature, a deep and wise ring.
The character of Cassirer's scholarship, however, was such
that, though enriched and extended, its intrinsic direction was
never changed by his co-operation with Warburg. A reader
familiar with Cassirer's work, but unfamiliar with these per-
sonal details, would never divine the intimate relationship
which existed between the two men, so much did all the writings
of those years appear as the necessary continuation of Cassirer's
earlier work. When Warburg died in 1929, it was Cassirer
who spoke at his grave: a commemoration of the strange and
fruitful meeting of two thinkers of almost diametrically op-
posed character and tendency. Yet they had one great goal in
common: to understand the nature and history of the symbolic
expression of the human mind.
If the Warburg Institute has grown into a stable institution,
we owe much of its success to Cassirer's advice and help. If
Warburg were alive, he would testify how greatly he admired
Cassirer. But above all, he would express his deep gratitude to
the man who, better than any psychiatrist, had helped him to
ERNST CASSIRER 51
find the way back into the world. Even those of you who knew
Cassirer could hardly imagine the immense impression that his
clear and calm personality made on a mind cut off from the
world and striving hard to reach the port of health by exerting
his powers of reason. Cassirer, Olympian and aloof, was yet
the most humane and learned doctor of the soul. Higher praise
could hardly be given to any man.
F. SAXL
THE WARBURG INSTITUTE
UNIVERSITY OF LONDON
LONDON, ENGLAND
4
A STUDENT'S NACHRUF
FRIENDS OF ERNST CASSIRER:
I SHOULD like you to know something of what the stu-
dents in the Department of Philosophy at Columbia felt for
Ernst Cassirer. By recounting to you the substance of my own
experience and my own feelings I shall be summing up the
experience and the feelings of all of us here who were the
students of Ernst Cassirer. For, my relations with Ernst Cas-
sirer were surely typical and most representative.
As a mere apprentice to that trade in which Ernst Cassirer
was a revered guild-master, I am aware that language is a
fragile bridge to understanding, and one that is too easily col-
lapsible. Thus, if someone were to ask me: "How well did
you know Ernst Cassirer?," I should feel the need of beginning
my answer by making a certain verbal distinction. In terms
reminiscent of one of the great problems with which Professor
Cassirer came boldly to grips, I should have to reply: "Just
what do you mean by the word 'know'?"
If by your question you mean to inquire whether I enjoyed
a personal friendship with my teacher, whether our acquaint-
ance was an intimate one, then regretfully I should have to
answer that in this sense I did not "know" Ernst Cassirer. The
time was too short, the days were too few for this.
But if your meaning is: "Did I have an understanding of
the kind of man that Ernst Cassirer was?," then I should
answer, and every one of his students would answer with me:
"I did, and I do."
Ernst Cassirer was an exile, a Jew, who wrote: "In our life,
in the life of a modern Jew, there is no room left for any joy
or complacency. All this has gone forever. No Jew whatsoever
52
A STUDENT'S NACHRUF 53
can and will ever overcome the terrible ordeal of these last
years." And yet Ernst Cassirer was a man whose presence be-
spoke serenity as surely as do the green leaves bespeak the
springtime. This sereneness of countenance and mind was noted
by all. But it was not the serenity which is unconscious of the
storm j it was, rather, a kind of winged serenity which surveyed,
which comprehended, and yet which nobly overrode the storm.
And so, having seen this, we knew that Ernst Cassirer was a
good man. For only the good are serene.
We were impressed by the depth and variety of his knowl-
edge. The depth we were prepared for, but the variety amazed
us. I recall that, after I had seen An Essay On Man, I asked two
members of the department whether Professor Cassirer were
really at home in all the varied fields surveyed by this book.
They assured me that, in truth, he was. And I am ashamed to
confess that I was dismayed at this confirmation} for it seemed
to me that I, a beginner in philosophy, could never hope my-
self to be the master of such a manifold of learning. But this
dismay was supplanted soon by a spirit of emulation; and the
kind of scholarship which was Ernst Cassirer's became for me
something to strive for, a goal which I might not attain, but a
goal which was truly clear, for I had seen it defined in the
being of a living man.
In the lecture hall we were particularly impressed by the
profound and appropriate allusions made to every field of
knowledge. In the seminar room we learned to wait for the
brilliant interjection, the almost casual sentence which put a
philosopher or a problem in a new and more illuminating light.
In short, we came to realize, all of us, in time, that as a man
of learning and wisdom, as a scholar, Ernst Cassirer was
unique.
He was an ardent man. I understood this on the day of the
last class he taught. I was on my way to class that day, when
in the distance I was glad to see Professor Cassirer walking in
the same direction. I quickened my pace in order to catch up
with him. When I came closer I saw that, as he walked, he
was reading a book, which absorption accounted for the slow-
ness of his step. As I watched him, he paused to concentrate on
54 EDWARD MURRAY CASE
what he was reading, and, in that moment, I perceived that
Ernst Cassirer, at the age of seventy, was more ardently in-
terested in the contents of that book than most young men
have ever been interested in the contents of any book. And so
I did not disturb Professor Cassirer, and I am glad now that I
did not, for the discreet man does not intrude upon a lover.
Thus, being serene and good, being learned and wise and
ardent, being all these things, Ernst Cassirer was a great man.
And so we, the students of philosophy at Columbia esteem
it to have been a great privilege and a great honor in our lives
that, in this great university of the New World, we were the last
students of the lineal descendant of Immanuel Kant, that we
were the last students of the last flowering of German philoso-
phy. And I do not speak from paper or from notes or in
words formulated coldly and with deliberation, but I speak
from the heart when I say: We loved Ernst Cassirer.
EDWARD MURRAY CASE
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
5
ERNST CASSIRER
WE ARE gathered together in a memorial to Ernst Cas-
sirer. We meet here to convey to each other, in some
poor words, what he meant to us as man and philosopher. It
will take more, of course, than we have to give in this meeting
to reveal what significance his work has and will continue to
have for many others besides ourselves} and, fortunately, there
is to be a volume of studies of his philosophy, where this
further and more adequate appraisal may have place. But we
can, at this moment, do something good for ourselves and for
the memory of our friend, if we simply speak of the things
that promptly stand out in our consciousness now rather than
strain at the impossible task of offering a comprehensive pic-
ture of the whole man and his work. These first thoughts that
come in the dawning realization of our loss have a very personal
character. Each one of us has his own individual feelings and
appreciations. We are sharing these together in this hour and
making the man we have known even more real for each other
as we here tell how we best remember him.
Four years ago, almost to the day, Ernst Cassirer came to
this country, accompanied by his wife, without whom we who
have but known him these few years cannot think of him.
They came here direct from Sweden, on the last ship permitted
to go out, in May, 1941. They made themselves at home in
America, where they already had some dear ones waiting for
their arrival. I believe that we can say that Ernst Cassirer was
happy here, both in New Haven, where he first came to live,
and then in New York.
Let me speak to you after his own fashion. It was always
his way, when telling of some other thinker or philosopher,
55
56 CHARLES W. HENDEL
first to quote something that was completely characteristic of
the man. He often quoted at greater length, some people felt,
than he needed to do. I recall a publisher saying this in criticism
of one of his manuscripts. "We want more Cassirer," he com-
plained, "and less of what other people have thought." But
what other people had learned and thought was too important
to Ernst Cassirer to be made so little of. He always knew that
many artists of the mind had searched for and shaped the
truths or the problems for inquiry with which he himself was
concerned and he believed it a duty to give their "authority,"
in this fine and original sense of the term, before he ventured
to present his own contribution to the matter. This was his
style of life and thought. It expressed both his generous regard
for other thinkers and his modest estimate of his own place
alongside them in the halls of philosophy.
I have in my hands a precious document and memento writ-
ten in his own hand. Last year at this time he was saying fare-
well to his friends at Yale. He spoke at the Philosophical Club
meeting where all of us assembled to express to him our appre-
ciation of the three good years we had been privileged to have
together in our study of philosophy. This is what he said to
us on that occasion:
Looking back on my long academic life I must regard it as a long
Odyssey. It was a sort of pilgrimage that led me from one university to
the other, from one country to the other, and, at the end, from one
hemisphere to the other. This Odyssey was rich in experiences in human
and intellectual adventures. What was most delightful and gratifying in
this long academic journey was the fact that it became also, more and
more, a sentimental journey. For at any new place I was lucky enough
to find new friends. I found colleagues who were ready to help me in
my work, and I found students who were interested in my philosophical
views.
When I came to this country I cherished the hope that the same would
happen here. And this hope was not disappointed. But, on the other hand,
I found something more and something better something that passed
all my expectations. I was not only supposed to give my own lectures
and hold my own courses. I was invited to have a share in the work of my
colleagues. During my first year I had the pleasure and the great privilege
to be invited to a seminar on the philosophy of history . . . ; in my second
ERNST CASSIRER 57
year I could participate in a seminar on the philosophy of science . . .;
in my third year we had a conjoint seminar on the theory of knowledge,
. . . That was, indeed, a new experience to me and a very suggestive
and stimulating one. I look back on these conjoint seminars with real
pleasure and gratitude. I am sure I have learned very much from them.
Of course, it was in a sense a rather bold enterprise, the bringing
together of so many philosophers. As a rule philosophers seem not to be
very fond of such a close cooperation. They are apt to disagree in their
views, in their interests, in their very definition of what philosophy is and
means. And the task that had to be solved here was so much the more
doubtful and risky since three different generations were expected to
have a share in a common work. To the struggle between philosophers
there was added the struggle between the generations. In many of our
modern systems of education we are told that it is hopeless to reconcile the
views of men belonging to different generations. We are told that, there
is a deep and insurmountable gap between the generations; that every
new generation must feel in its own way, think its own thoughts and
speak its own language. I regard this as a misleading and dangerous
dogma and as a dogma that throughout my life I found constantly
contradicted by my own personal experience. The older I grow, so much
the more I become interested in the work and the thoughts of the
younger men. And I always found that they readily answered to my
interest. To my great satisfaction I had the same experience here. . . .
Of course the younger people criticized me sometimes rather severely.
They could not always agree with me; they thought perhaps that they
had outgrown, a long time ago, some of the philosophic ideas and ideals
that were still very dear to me. But, after all, they listened to me and
they tolerated my very old-fashioned philosophy. They could see my
point as well as I could see theirs.
This ended his "brief report," as he then called it, on his
life amongst us, though he had even other things to express,
more personal, on that occasion. But what he said in these
words just quoted belongs to no particular group of colleagues
and students or university. It was as much his message to Co-
lumbia this year as it was to Yale then. It was his report on his
American sojourn. And while it reports our academic life as
he really saw it, it has greater truth still as a revelation of him-
self.
That friendship of which he told, the eager interest in ideas,
the tolerance of mind . . . "they could see my point as well as
58 CHARLES W. HENDEL
I could see theirs." All this happened because of him. It was
his doing. "I was lucky enough to find new friends." Lucky?
Oh no, he was himself the architect of these rewarding per-
sonal and academic relations which we all so much enjoyed. He
was the philosopher who brings to birth the philosophic spirit
and way of life in those who lived and worked with him.
"The older I grow," he had said, "the more I become in-
terested in the thoughts of the younger men." Very few men
of seventy will even think of saying that, and there are fewer
still who, if they were to say it, would ever be believed. We
know that he said this, however, in all sincerity and without the
shadow of a boast. He spoke with transparent honesty when he
acknowledged such an intellectual benefit for himself in his
association with youth and with the younger scholars. It was a
confession made in fine simplicity by one who was a genuine
teacher of men.
He rejoiced, as you saw, at the idea especially of keeping
three generations in touch with each other in common work, the
young, the middle-aged and the old. He was well aware of the
risk involved in such an enterprise in education. We realize
from his own words, too, that he felt the severity of the youth-
ful criticism directed at his particular philosophic beliefs and
ideasj but we saw him, too, meeting the criticism with reason
and patience and generosity, and it was, in fact, by so doing that
he brought several generations so happily together in adven-
tures of learning. Here is another classic trait of the philosopher.
We all remember Socrates at the same age and doing the same
things.
No man of his high caliber could live through these last
twenty-five years without giving profound thought to the
whole plight of humanity in all the nations of the world. He
knew what adversity meant close at home. His knowledge of
vast periods of history brought multitudes of other instances
that could weigh down the spirit with a heavy burden. He was
sensitive to the pain and the hopelessness that many have to
suffer and must continue to suffer. Yet his vision kept in view
the dignity and continuity of man's long struggle forward to a
life that befits humanity. Thus he succeeded in attaining sere-
ERNST CASSIRER 59
nity himself. Yet he was never aloof and abstracted, for he
gave thought and individual sympathy for the small personal
trials of everyone whom he knew. It was good for one's soul
to be with him. And no one who knew him at all could miss
that cheerfulness which was a sort of spiritual radiance that
warmed and brightened our fellowship. This is the thing, I
believe, we should bear in mind now, as we go on to recall all
the other things that Ernst Cassirer has meant to us.
CHARLES W. HENDEL
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
YALE UNIVERSITY
c
Hendrik J. Pos
RECOLLECTIONS OF ERNST CASSIRER
RECOLLECTIONS OF ERNST CASSIRER*
HONORED by the invitation to contribute to the Cassirer
volume, I should like to carry out this assignment by
saying something about Cassirer, the man, as well as about his
philosophical significance. I had the privilege of studying Cas-
sirer's works even before I first heard his lectures in Hamburg
during the summer semester of 1928. I then met him in the
Spring of 1929 at the Second University Congress in Davos;
and since 1934 I have been in closer personal relationship with
him, which led to my spending a month with him in Goteberg
in the summer of 1936, for the purpose of co-operating on a task
which, due to unforeseen circumstances, was never brought to
completion. The last word I ever had from him was a postcard,
dated May 1940, expressing his concern over how I had fared
since the invasion. Shortly thereafter I was interned, and when
the war was over the news of his death reached me.
When I was a young student, Ernest Cassirer's works on the
history of the theory of knowledge, Substance and Function, as
well as on Einstein's theory, opened up to me the whole world
of scientific thought, which was far removed from a student of
classical philology. This study became determinative for my
philosophical development, insofar as I learned from it the
nature of natural science in contrast to cultural (social) science,
and how the former has gradually created its own correct path
for itself, a path which leads form Galileo through Newton to
Einstein and the moderns. If, as a young admirer of the Greeks,
one is inclined to take all of Plato's and Aristotle's speculative
thought for immutable truth, then nothing is more instructive
than to take cognizance of the inexorable course pursued by
* Translated by Dr. Robert W. Bretall.
63
64 HENDRIK J. POS
science since the Renaissance. To this end Cassirer's Erkenntnis-
problem is an excellent guide. Endowed with a wonderfully
flexible style, he knows how to transpose himself into every
point of view, to present it con amore y and at the same time to
trace the great lineage which leads from speculative ontology
and abstract verbalism to the rational empiricism of modern
natural science. It is most gratifying that the three volumes
which carry the treatment up to Hegel, are very soon, through
the interest of Professor Hendel of Yale, to be completed with
the fourth volume, which Cassirer had left in manuscript. In
this major work of its kind Cassirer exhibited an unexcelled
mastery, command, and disposition of his material, and in
addition, a luminous facility of presentation, which remains
unique in German philosophy. It is a history of recent philoso-
phy from the standpoint of the progress of the natural sciences.
It may be that here and there in the quotations there is some
room for improvement: the whole [work] is the expression of
an idea, which emerges clearly from the development of the
natural sciences in modern times, the idea, namely, of the transi-
tion from metaphysical speculation to rational understanding.
Here it is shown how, by a gradual process of trial and error, and
under the decisive influence of scientific savants, the intellectual
and technical mastery over nature has come about; and how, in
this process, the basic viewpoints have altered. One cannot claim
that any old philosophical position fits into this development
equally well: ontologism sees itself compelled to separate the
empirical development of science from the philosophical deter-
mination of fundamental principles, in order thus to keep the
changes of empirical science far away from the philosophical
enterprise. Cassirer demonstrated at what cost the a prioristic
and established results of philosophy are purchased by this
method. He also showed how the historical development has
shoved aside this dualism, which amounts to a doctrine of the
twofold nature of truth, and how Kant's method of the analysis
of basic principles an analysis which proceeds from the very
fact of existing science does justice to the progress of science
without robbing philosophy of her own task. Further, he showed
how the application of Kant's analysis to natural science today
RECOLLECTIONS OF ERNST CASSIRER 65
makes it necessary to go beyond the content of Kant's doctrine.
Of this the Relativity theory is the classical demonstration, inso-
far as it modifies the intuition of space and time, which Kant
still was able to lay down as the foundation of physics. This
[theory] makes it clear that the advance of knowledge consists
not only in the material of new experience being incorporated
into the fixed categories, but also in the fact that the basic as-
sumptions themselves must be revised from time to time, in
order to bring new facts into non-contradictory connection with
old. Philosophically considered, Cassirer taught how to extend
the idea of the process under which the Marburg school sub-
sumed "knowledge," to include the basic categories themselves
and their determination thereby going beyond Kant and his
orthodox adherents. This was the only way of safeguarding
Kantianism against the reproach of dogmatism, and of prevent-
ing it from being left behind by the advance of science, as had
happened in the case of ontological speculation. Through his
"scientism" Cassirer's philosophy has achieved an international
reputation which puts him close beside the kindred figure of
Leon Brunschvicg. At -Davos I was present at conversations
during which the two thinkers made the discovery of their
spiritual affinity.
Cassirer was so many-sided, that his total work was far from
exhausted by his writings in the field of epistemology. To others
it may be left to come to closer terms with the abiding merit of
his studies in the history of epistemology, in theory of relativity,
and in the problem of causality in recent physics. I turn now to
his philosophy of culture, set down in the first two volumes of
the Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen. In 1923 appeared
the volume on language, and in 1925 that on mythical thought.
The first is a phenomenology of the formation of our world-
view in terms of a philosophy of language; whereas the second
volume lays bare the driving force which conditioned the crea-
tion of a religion. Cassirer was the first to apply the basic ideas
of neo-Kantianism concerning spirit and its creative energy to
the pre-scientific world-view. Here, too, he was guided by that
historical sense which distinguishes his treatment of the problem
of knowledge. With the aid of an intensive study of the struc-
66 HENDRIK J. POS
tures of primitive languages for which the Warburg Institute
in Hamburg provided him with the jviferials he sought to
construct a line of development leadihg from the most ele-
mentary categories of the world to the more objective ones, and
finally to the cognitive results of the sciences. The primitive
languages, taken as witnesses to a very remote stage of the hu-
man grasp of the universe, offered him valuable supporting
evidence for his notion of the gradually advancing "symbolical"
formation of the world-picture, which in the interest of ob-
jectivity and of comprehensive unification, gets farther and
farther away from the original, primitive intuitions. He showed
in a convincing manner how an originally strong, vital, and
qualitatively conditioned world-view gives way gradually to an
objective and more universal one, this transition attesting itself
in the transformations of language as it proceeds from a sensory,
qualitative stage to a symbolical-abstract mode of expression.
Thus it becomes clear how the requirements of science make it
necessary to introduce symbols which in precision and fruitful-
ness surpass those of language.
One may perhaps harbor some doubt as to whether the cur-
rent linguistic structure of a society is, indeed, always so faithful
an expression of its manner of thought and feeling whether
now and then, let us say, the external structure may not be in-
adequate to the thought-content. No damage is thereby done
to the methodological principle of Cassirer 's theory of language,
and it is to be gratefully acknowledged that through him the
researches instigated by Wilhelm von Humboldt and by Wundt
have been fruitfully continued and have received their philo-
sophical foundation. The basic idea which sustains both the
theory of language and the theory of knowledge is the fact
that, by introducing symbols, the human consciousness succeeds
in ordering and governing the welter of sensations. The cate-
gories expressed in languages pave the way for that logical
order for which the sciences are striving.
Cassirer's philosophy of culture is a philosophy of the logos,
not in the narrow sense of "ratio" or of the intellect in the purely
theoretical sense, but rather in the sense of that spiritual, form-
indudng energy which appears in science, society, and art. As a
RECOLLECTIONS OF ERNST CASSIRER 67
critic Cassirer was as ill disposed to metaphysics as toward that
irration? 1 ' *n which stirred mightily in Germany between the
two world wars. His Kantian rationalism was bound to come
into conflict with the intuitionism of the waxing phenome-
nology, and especially with the ontological and "philosophy of
life" stamp which Heidegger imparted to it. The Kant inter-
pretations presented by Cassirer and Heidegger, together with
the ensuing discussions, constituted the focal point of the Inter-
national Davos University course in 1929.
The two standpoints could be mutually clarified, but they
could not be brought any closer together. Cassirer [on his part]
emphasized the spiritual law, the form, by means of which man
liberates himselfs from his immediacy and his anxiety. This is
the way in which the finite mind participates in the infinite.
Whereas Heidegger expounded his book on Kant and the Prob-
lem of Metaphysics, which had just been published. He ex-
pressed the opinion that Kant's central problem was not at all
that of scientific knowledge, but rather the problem of the
metaphysical comprehension of being. Kant's philosophy he de-
clared to be a philosophy of finite man, whose access to the In-
finite is denied, but whose orientation toward the transcendent
confirms his very finitude. The difference was clear. Heidegger
persisted in the terminus a quo, in the situation at the point of
departure, which for him is the dominating factor in all phi-
losophizing, Cassirer [on the other hand] aimed at the
terminus ad quern, at liberation through the spiritual form, in
science, practical activity, and art. The contrast was not theoreti-
cal, but human. Here stood, on the one side, the representative
of the best in the universalistic traditions of German culture, a
man for whom Idealism was the victorious power which is called
to mold and spiritualize human life. This man, the heir of Kant,
stood there tall, powerful, and serene. His effect upon his
audience lay in his mastery of exposition, in the Apollonian ele-
ment. From the beginning he had within him the liberal culture
of Central Europe, the product of a long tradition. In both
spiritual lineaments and external appearance, this man belonged
to the epoch of Kant, of Goethe, and of Kleist, to each of whom
he had dedicated some of his literary efforts. And over against
68 HENDRIK J. POS
him stood an altogether different type of man, who struggled
with Cassirer over the deepest intentions of Kant's writings. This
man too had a gigantic intellect. As a man, however, he was
completely different. Of $etit bourgeois descent from southwest
Germany, he had never lost his accent. In him this was readily
forgiven, being taken as a mark of firm-rootedness and peasant
genuineness. There was, however, much more that was of inter-
est in this man. In his youth he was destined for the priesthood,
and was to receive his seminary education at Constance. He ran
away, however, and became a renegade. At home as almost no
one else in Aristotle and the scholastics, in Kant and Hegel, he
constructed for himself a philosophy which, on the side of
method, came close to the phenomenology of his teacher, Hus-
serl. In point of content, however, this philosophy was of course
entirely his own: there lay feelings at the base of it which
were concealed by the gigantic intellectual superstructure. But
when one listened to his lectures, listened to this gloomy, some-
what whining and apprehensive tone of voice, then there flowed
forth the feelings which this man harbored or at least which he
knew how to awaken. These were feelings of loneliness, of op-
pression, and of frustration, such as one has in anxious dreams,
but now present in a clear and wakeful state of mind.
The bearer of this mood-philosophy had the ear of Germany's
academic youth, not on account of his prodigious knowledge of
the history of philosophy, but rather because he translated feel-
ings which in that youth found a soil already prepared. This
man came to be regarded as the great hope. His searching book
on Kant had succeeded in showing those dark, melancholy feel-
ings as determinative even for the philosophy of the famous
sage of Konigsberg. Man is a finite being and cannot escape his
finitude this, the book taught, was to have been the deepest
meanings of Kant's thought. This carried conviction, from the
very first, for the youth of a land where the feeling of frustra-
tion had for ten years now been alive in a sense other than the
merely metaphysical one. The little man with the sinister wilful
speech, who was at home with these morose feelings, who loved
to say that philosophy is no fun, the despiser of Goethe [this
man] over against the representative of Enlightenment, basking
RECOLLECTIONS OF ERNST CASSIRER 69
in spiritual fortune, for whom the philosopher's life was joy and
inspiration, and who in Goethe paid homage to the universal
man.
The whole discussion was the intuitive representation of this
profound cleavage between the two men. The one abrupt, nega-
tive, his attitude one of protest} the other kindly, gracious, ac-
commodating, always concerned to give his partner more honor
than he deserved. The two men reached an agreement on the
meaning of Kant's Schematism, which represents the original
intermingling of sense and understanding. This, however, left
the main questions undecided: each one viewed Kant from the
standpoint of his own humanity, with the difference, however,
that the one admitted that metaphysical expressions are not
lacking in the text, whereas the other would in no wise grant
that the main concern of the Critique of Pure Reason was aimed
at grounding the scientific knowledge of nature philosophically.
Long went the discussions back and forth, until finally they
terminated. The conclusion was not without human symbolism;
the magnanimous man offered his hand to his opponent: but it
was not accepted.
The Davos conversations were symbolical of the tragic decline
toward which German philosophy was hastening. Whoever
at that time still did not grasp what was going on, could get a
glimpse of it four years later, when fate divided the two Kant
interpreters as irreconcilably as had their manners of thought:
for Ernst Cassirer there no longer was any room in Germany.
He emigrated to Oxford. In the same year his opponent in the
Davos discussions was appointed rector of the University of
Freiburg, and in his inaugural address professed himself un-
reservedly for National Socialism. Germany's spiritual collapse
had taken place, and Heidegger placed his philosophy at the
service of the self-destruction of the German intelligentsia.
When Ernst Cassirer was forced to leave the University of
Hamburg in 1933, he stood at the peak of his international
reputation. It was primarily because of him and Husserl that
German philosophy, at that time, flourished before the world.
For the regime, quite naturally, this was no reason whatsoever
for making an exception in his case. On the contrary, interna-
70 HENDRIK J. POS
tional recognition was then taken as a proof of unreliability,
especially if on top of this one was a non-Aryan. Cassirer loved
the free-thinking Hamburg, whose newly founded university he
had co-operatively helped to build ever since 1919. The leave-
taking must have been painful, perhaps even more so than the
cutting injustice perpetrated by his dismissal. So magnificent
a person was he, however, that no word of bitterness was ever
heard from him about the injustice done. With Olympian
serenity he departed. A man who for many years had lived in
Cassirer's shadow became his successor, and expressed his pleas-
ure at the course of events. Cassirer rapidly made friends in
Oxford. He learned English and delivered lectures. It was not
easy to gain a genuine understanding for neo-Kantianism. It
was during his stay in England that Cassirer celebrated his
sixtieth birthday. The co-operative volume, Philosophy and
History, which was presented to him on this occasion (Oxford,
Clarendon Press, 1936) is a living testimonial to the diversity
of influence and of inspiration which radiated from him upon
philosophers and historians of culture in all countries. The
twenty-two essays had been edited by Cassirer's student Kli-
bansky and the Oxford Kantian scholar and historian of phi-
losophy, H. J. Paton. The contributions came from England,
France, Holland, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, and
America. In the preface the editors wrote: "It is our hope that
this book may bear witness to that enduring spiritual bond which
unites scholars of different countries and different traditions."
The name of Cassirer actually symbolized a universalism and
internationalism which recognizes every member of mankind for
its spiritual contribution to the whole culture pattern, on the
presupposition that through such mutual recognition, the unity
of mankind will be honored and promoted.
The further course of Cassirer's life was to bear still further
testimony to this universalism. In 1935 he emigrated to Sweden,
where his former student Jacobson vacated for him the chair
in philosophy at the University, while he himself accepted the
appointment as Governor of the Province of Bohnslau. Here
too Cassirer made devoted friends and enthusiastic students.
And here in the summer of 1936 I had the privilege of being
RECOLLECTIONS OF ERNST CASSIRER 71
allowed to carry on a series of conversations with him in a sub-
ject for which we had conceived the plan of a co-operative
volume during his stay in Amsterdam: the influence of the
Greek language on philosophy. Was Greek from the very first
a language well adapted to philosophical thought? Or did the
thinkers rather take the instrument at hand in its natural state
and adapt it to their particular needs of expression? How far
does the unconscious influence of the inner linguistic form of
Greek extend to the construction of metaphysical concepts?
These and similar questions we discussed intensively} during
which process Cassirer unfolded his masterly gift of intellectual
sympathy and dialectical skill. After these preparatory conversa-
tions we promised each other to work them out during the next
summer. It never got that far. Since 1936 I have remained in
correspondence with Cassirer, but have never seen him again.
A very promising participation in a Hegel conference at Amers-
foort had to be declined by him for reasons of health. In Sweden
too Cassirer did fruitful work. His stay in the North furnished
him the occasion for taking up his Cartesian studies once more
and for engaging in documentary research on Descartes' life in
Stockholm. The fruits of these years were many an article in the
philosophical journal Theoria, edited by Ake Petzall, a book
on the development of the concept of causality, and the book on
Descartes.
In May, 1941, Cassirer came to America with the last ship
which was permitted to make the crossing. Of his work at Yale,
until 1944, and at Columbia until his death on April 13, 1945,
Professor Charles Hendel has given a beautiful account in the
Journal of Philosophy and Phenomenological Research (Sept.,
1945, 156-159). The quotation there reproduced really consti-
tutes the autobiography of Ernst Cassirer. A great man looks
back upon the Odyssey of his life, in the course of which he has
had to wander from land to land and from continent to conti-
nent. He did it modestly, cheerfully, and magnificently. Sub-
jectively considered, this man's gratitude to others is perfectly
sincere; whereas taken objectively, it is not without irony, since
it was not he but the others who had cause to be grateful. But
that is the way Ernst Cassirer was; he sought no glory, and yet
72 HENDRIK J. POS
he gained it; he esteemed others higher than himself, but
actually was their superior. This was the secret of the inspiring
and uplifting effect which emanated from his presence. There
was nothing in him of professorial vainglory, and yet he was a
teacher beyond compare. He did not hesitate to cite the writings
of a man who had lived for many years in his shadow and who
was openly jealous of him. And I can still hear him speaking,
in Davos, to a very young instructor: "You and I have the same
philosophical interests, and I am very glad of this." This was his
self-giving virtue, the generosite of the Descartes he so greatly
admired. One scarcely knows what to marvel at most, this man's
gigantic intellect, his consummate form of expression, or his
chivalrous humanity.
His philosophy reveals his character through its capacity for
transposing itself sympathetically into various and sundry phil-
osophical viewpoints, without thereby losing the distinctive
lines of his own thinking. To the editor of this book I have to
express my gratitude for the opportunity of bearing witness, by
a short and fleeting sketch, to my grateful admiration for a man
to whom German philosophy owes more than to any other of
its current representatives (viz.,) that in the time of its shame
and its decline, it has been able to maintain its age-old renown
in the eyes of the world.
HENDRIK J. Pos
PHILOSOPHICAL FACULTY
UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
I
Carl H. Hamburg
CASSIRER'S CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY
CASSIRER'S CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY
IF IT IS the mark of a great thinker that death cannot
interrupt the continuity of his intellectual influence, and
if, furthermore, an ever growing demand for his published
thought may be taken as one way of measuring his greatness,
the late Ernst Cassirer must well be accorded this rare title.
Within three years after an untimely death cut short his teach-
ing career at Columbia University, there have rolled off the
presses several printings of his Essay on Man (first published
in 1944), Language and Myth (translated in 1946 and already
out of print) and Myth of the State (fourth printing since
1946), all of which have simultaneously been translated into
Spanish and some of which will soon appear in French, Ger-
man, and Dutch. In addition, we may expect in the not too
distant future English editions of Determinism and Indeter-
minism in Modern Physics? the fourth volume of his famous
Erkenntnisproblem? the Philosophy of the Enlightenment?
and possibly, the Logic of the Humanities? Spanish transla-
tions of Kant's Life and Work? and the Philosophy of Sym-
bolic Forms 6 as well as posthumous publication in German of
1 Dcterminlsmus und Indeterminismus in der modernen Physik} Historische und
systematische Studien zum Kausalproblem. (Goeteborgs Hoegskolas Arsskrift. Vol.
XLIIj 1936) 5 ix, 265 pp.
*To be published sometime in 1948, this volume will deal with physical,
biological and historical methods. (Approx. 500 pp.)
1 Die Philosophic der Aufklaerung. (Tuebingen, Mohr, 1932)$ 491 pp.
* Zur Logik der Kulturwissenschaftenj Fuenf Studien. (Der Gegenstand der
Kulturwissenschaftj Ding- und Ausdruckswahrnehmung j Naturbegriffe und Kul-
turbegriffej Formproblem und Kausalproblem j Die "Tragoedie der Kultur".)
(Goeteborgs Hoegskolas Arsskrift $ Vol. XL VII $ 1942)$ 139 pp.
* Kant's Leben und Lehre. Vol. XI of . Cassirer's edition of Kant's ScMften
(Berlin, Bruno Cassirer, 1918) j viii, 448 pp.
* Philosophic der symbolischen Formen (see Bibliography in this Vol.)
75
76 CARL H. HAMBURG
his Kleinere Schriften 7 and the collection of essays into a
Goethe-book.
Now, if these publishing announcements may be taken to
reflect a considerable preoccupation with the work of Cassirer,
such interest is certainly not properly taken cognizance of in our
teaching curricula. It is doubtful whether in any of the many
courses, offered on the subject of "Contemporary Philosophy"
in American colleges and universities, more than summary
if any mention is made of the philosophy of Cassirer. In the
case of this thinker, we seem to be facing the rather familiar
paradox that a lively 'interest' in his philosophy goes hand in
hand with just as lively an ignorance concerning what his
philosophy is about. Although there is undoubtedly more than
one reason for this circumstance, a decisive one, I believe, must
be seen in the fact that, whereas Cassirer achieved early fame
with his historical works, his philosophy proper was not de-
veloped before the publication of his Philosophie der sym-
bolischen Foremen, the latest volume of which appeared in 1929,
at a time when in Germany phenomenology and the "lebens-
philosophischen" precursors of existentialist philosophies had
all but eclipsed the classicism of Cassirer's theme and style.
Cassirer's philosophy proper has, accordingly, neither re-
ceived the attention that a German intelligentsia gave to lesser
intellectual events in the anxious pre-Hitler years nor has an
English-speaking audience had the opportunity to satisfy by a
closer study of a translated version of the Philosophie der
symbolischen Formen the interest in his thought which such
books as An Essay on Man and Language and Myth have al-
ready provoked. Although it is to be hoped that arrangements
for an English translation of Cassirer's magnum of us will soon
be made, in the meantime there may be some value in sketching
somewhat broadly what may be termed his 'conception of phi-
losophy.' To this purpose we shall examine Cassirer's symbolic-
form concept, upon the proper understanding of which hinges
both his conception of what philosophy has been and what it
must be, if it is to give full and impartial attention to the
T Containing a number of previously published essays, most of which are out
of print by now.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 77
phenomena of the "natural" as well as of the "cultural"
sciences, to both the Natur- und Kulturwissenschaften.
THE SYMBOLIC FORM CONCEPT
a. Terminological distinctions
The term "symbolic form" is employed by Cassirer in at
least three distinct, though related, senses:
(1) It covers what is more frequently referred to as the
"symbolic relation," the "symbol-concept," the "symbolic func-
tion," or, simply, the "symbolic" (das Symbolische) .
(2) It denotes the variety of cultural forms which as myth,
art, religion, language, and science exemplify the realms of
application for the symbol-concept.
(3) It is applied to space, time, cause, number, etc. which
as the most pervasive symbol-relations are said to constitute,
with characteristic modifications, such domains of objectivity as
listed under (2).
In correspondence with this division, we shall in the sequel
deal first with the "symbol-concept." Indication will be given
of both the "cultural" import attributed to it by Cassirer and
the essentially Kantian epistemological provisions within which
it is developed. We shall attempt an adequate definition of this
concept and consider both objections and a possible defense for
its maintenance. We shall examine, secondly, how a philosophy
thus oriented may be conceived as a transition from a critique of
reason to a critique of culture. As such, it would suggest a
widening of the scope of philosophic concern by putting the
"transcendental question" beyond science to other types of
institutionalized activities which, such as art, language, science,
etc., actually define the meaning of the term "culture." And,
thirdly, we shall view Cassirer's inquiry into symbolic forms as
a study of the basic (intuitional and categorial) forms of syn-
thesis (space, time, cause, number, etc.) and their characteristi-
cally different functioning in a greater variety of contexts than
was considered by Kant. If presented thus, one could clarify just
what type of metaphysics would be both possible and profitable
within Cassirer's philosophy of symbolic forms.
78 CARL H. HAMBURG
b. The Symbol-Concept. Efistemological considerations
As the most universal concept to be formulated within Cas-
sirer's philosophy, the symbol-concept is to cover "the totality
of all phenomena which in whatever form exhibit 'sense in
the senses' (Sinnerjuellung im Sinnlichen) and in which some-
thing 'sensuous' (ein Sinnliches) is represented as a particular
embodiment of a 'sense' (Bedeutung y meaning)." 8 Here a
definition of the symbol-concept is given by way of the two
terms of the "sensuous" on one hand and the "sense" (mean-
ing) on the other, and a relation between the two, which is most
frequently referred to as "one representing the other." The
extremely general character of this pronouncement must be
noted. Cassirer's claim exceeds by far what has ordinarily been
admitted about the "symbolical character" of knowledge. Al-
though not all philosophers would subscribe to the idea that
all knowledge is of a mediate type, it could perhaps be said that
to the extent that knowledge is taken to be mediate, it may also
be said to be "symbolical" by virtue of its dependence upon
(sets or systems of) signs which determine the discursive
(linguistic or mathematical) medium within which it is attained.
Whereas the history of ideas discloses a varying emphasis put
by different thinkers upon sometimes one, sometimes another
of the (symbolic) media to be trusted for the grand tour to the
"really real," it also appears to substantiate Cassirer's general
formula, according to which all knowledge as mediate is
defined as implying (besides an interpretant, mind, Geisi)
both: the given-ness of perceptual signs (sensuous vehicles, ein
Sinnliches) and something signified (meaning, Sinn). But, al-
though Cassirer's above quoted symbol-definition would indeed
be wide enough to cover such area of considerable agreement
with respect to the symbolically mediate character of knowl-
edge, note that it formulates no restrictions with respect to
cognitive discourse. The "representative" relation which is
asserted to hold between the senses and the sense (mean-
ing) is, in other words, not taken to be exhaustively defined by
*PMlosopMe der symbolischen Formen, Vol. Ill, 109. To be abbreviated
henceforth as: PSF.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 79
grammatical, logical, or mathematical syntax-types, which de-
termine the conventional forms of discourse within which
knowledge is held to be mediated. Instead, it is to cover "the
whole range of all phenomena within which there is sense in
the senses," i.e., in all contexts in which (e.g., on the expressive
and intuitional levels) experience is had as of "characters"
(persons) and "things" in space and time. The issue, therefore,
of a confrontation by "signs" of "facts," which would be
germane to all those views which consider essentially the dis-
cursive dimension of symbol-situations, cannot even come up
for a philosophy according to which "facts" cannot be evidence
for (or against) "symbols," simply because their very "factu-
ality" is not considered meaningful outside of some determinate
symbolic context. The objection, therefore, raised by many
philosophers against scholasticism, to the effect that the latter
replaced the consideration of facts by that of symbols (names),
need not invalidate Cassirer's position for which
there is no f actuality ... as an absolute . . . immutable datum; but
what we call a fact is always theoretically oriented in some way, seen
in regard to some . . . context and implicitly determined thereby. Theo-
retical elements do not somehow become added to a 'merely factual,' but
they enter into the definition of the factual itself. 9
Once the "facts," the state of affairs, the objects, which are
designated by conventional signs, are realized as themselves
partaking of expressive (qualitative) and perceptive (intui-
tional) "symbolisms" of their own, the question of the appli-
cation of symbols to facts is replaced by the question concerning
the "checking"of one symbol-context by another, considered
more reliable or more easily institutable.
In this connection, a brief consideration of the issue of con-
firmation may be to the point. In Carnap's version
the scientist describes his own observations concerning a certain planet
in a report Oi. Further, he takes into consideration a theory T, con-
cerning the movements of planets (also laws assumed for the justifiable
application of his instruments. C.H.). From Oi and T the astronomer
9 PSF, Vol. Ill, 475. See also: Substance and Function, 143.
80 CARL H. HAMBURG
deduces a prediction; he calculates the apparent position of the planet for
the next night. At that time, he will make a new observation and formu-
late it in a report Oz. Then he will compare the prediction P with Oa
and thereby find it either confirmed or not. 10
A theoretical symbolism, in other words, is confirmed when
the phenomena, which the symbolism predicts, are observed.
Concededly, however, there is a hypothetical reference to con-
text not only in the theory to be confirmed but also in the ob-
servations which do the confirming. "All observation involves
more or less explicitly the element of hypothesis." 11 On the
view proposed by Cassirer, to say that a theory (in combination
with statements regarding initial conditions) is confirmed by
"observation" would not require recognition of and recourse to
any non-symbolic factuality, disclosed to the senses free from
all elements of interpretation} but it would, instead, be equiva-
lent to saying that hypothetically constructed contexts (theories
regarding the orbit of a planet) would be confirmable if from
it certain data can be deduced (its position at a certain time)
such that, by appropriate co-ordination of a perceptual context,
what are defined as light-rays in one context, will be interpreted
as the determinate color and shape of a "thing" (planet) in
another. Furthermore: we have an "interpretant" with his
attendant "perspectives," a sign-signified relation on both the
theoretical and the observational levels. To hold that the
former stands in need of confirmation by the latter and not
vice versa ,to maintain that "the scientific criterion of objec-
tivity rests upon the possibility of occurrence of predicted per-
ceptions to a society of observers" (ibid., 5), is fully intelligible
within the provisions of Cassirer's view which cannot except ob-
servation from a symbolic interpretation. Whether as observa-
tion of pointer-readings or of "things," the "confirmatory"
character of observation does not depend upon its confrontation
by non-symbolic facts of symbolic theories, but rather upon the
easily (almost immediately) institutable and shareable nature
of the perceptual context in which we have "facts" and to
10 Rudolf Carnap, Foundations of Logic and Mathematics, i.
11 Victor Lenzen : Procedures of Empirical Science, 4.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 81
which all other contexts can be co-ordinated in varying degrees
of explicitness.
We suggest, therefore, that whereas the import of symbolic
media for the intelligibility of reality is certainly not a new
discovery and has been realized by philosophers from Plato to
Dewey, the thesis that a symbolic relation obtains for any
possible (culturally encounterable) context in which we per-
ceive or observe a "world," expresses what is most distinctive in
Cassirer's conception of philosophy.
A comparable extension of the philosophical concern beyond
the cognitive to other types of signifying and modes of sign-
usages has been advocated more recently by positivistic thinkers,
who are intent upon establishing a more secure foundation for
the discipline of semiotics. Unfortunately, Cassirer himself
nowhere explicitly differentiates his own type of inquiry from
the kind of sign-analyses carried on by, e.g., Carnap and
Morris. 12 We shall, therefore, briefly consider both areas of
agreement and points of divergence characteristic of the two
schools of thought before proceeding to examine the epistemo-
logical orientation within which Cassirer's own philosophy of
symbolic forms is developed.
Note that Cassirer could well agree with a view according
to which "the most effective characterization of a sign is the
following: S is a sign of D for I to the degree that I takes
account of D by virtue of the presence of S," 18 where I stands
for the interpretant of a sign, D for what is designated, and
S for the vehicle (mark, sound, or gesture) by means of which
D is designated to I. Yet, although the proposal to understand
sign-processes as "mediated-taking-accounts of" is also implied
in Cassirer's conception of the matter, there would be a charac-
teristic shift of terms. Where Morris, e.g., has his "interpre-
tant," Cassirer would speak in terms of "Bewusstsein" or
"Geist:" "the meaning of spirit (Geist) can be disclosed only
in its expression; the ideal form (what is designated) comes to
"Rudolf Carnap j Foundations of Logic and Mathematics^ 1939. Charles W.
Morris, Foundations of the Theory of Signs, 1938$ and Language , Signs and
Behavior, 1946.
M Charles W. Morris, foundations of the Theory of Signs, 4.
82 CARL H. HAMBURG
be known only in and with the system of sensible signs by
means of which it is expressed." 14 Likewise, the distinction be-
tween the sign-vehicle (S) and the designation of the sign (D)
by Cassirer is put in terms of a correlation alternatively called
"the sign and the signified," "the particular and the general,"
"the sensuous and its sense" (das Sinnliche imd sein Sinn).
There is agreement, then, on this basic point: for anything to be
a sign does not denote a property characterizing a special class
of objects, but speaking in the material mode it indicates
that it participates in the sign-process as a whole within which
it "stands" to somebody for something, or in the formal mode
that it can be defined only in terms of a three-term relation
of the form "I-S-D," where "I" designates the "taking-
account-of," "S" the mediators of the "taking-account-of," and
"D" what is taken account of. In Cassirer J s language: "The act
of the conceptual determination of what is designated (ernes
Inhalts) goes hand in hand with the act of its fixation by some
characteristic sign. Thus, all truly concise and exacting thought
is secured in the 'SymboUk* and 'Semiotik* which support it." 15
For a correct understanding of Cassirer's position all depends
here upon the interpretation we put upon this metaphor of "the
sign and the signified going hand in hand." For Morris, mani-
festly, the relationship suggested is one interchangeably alluded
to as one of signs "indicating," "announcing," or "suggesting"
the presence of whatever they denote, designate, or signify.
For Cassirer, on the other hand, HusserPs dictum in the matter
holds: "Das Bedeuten ist nicht eine Art des Zeichen-Seins im
Sinne der Anzeige" (To signify is not a way of being a sign in
the sense of being an indication.) 18 The indicative function of
signs, upon the broad basis of which Morris attempts to sketch
the foundations of a semiotic, is accordingly of just the kind
that Cassirer would have to consider as inadequate for an under-
standing of the symbolic function properly speaking. In the
formulation of this distinction by Susanne Langer: "The funda-
mental difference between signs and symbols is this difference
"PSF, Vol. I, 1 8.
M PF,Vol. I, 1 8.
16 Edmund Husserl, Logische Untersuchungen, Vol. II, 23.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 83
of association, and consequently of their use by the third party to
the meaning function, the subject: signs announce their objects
to him, whereas symbols lead him to conceive their objects." 17
Against this establishment of a "fundamental" difference,
Morris has advanced the objection that too much is made of
what essentially seems to amount to a mere difference of degree.
A symbol is on the whole a less reliable sign than is a sign (that is a
signal) . . . (the latter) being more closely connected with external
relations in the environment is more quickly subject to correction by the
environment. . , . But, since signals too have varying degrees of re-
liability, the difference remains one of degree. 18
Now, regardless of whether or not one agrees with Morris
that environmental correction in the case of signals is in all
contexts more reliable than purely symbolic procedures such as
provided, e.g., by derivations or calculations, one need not argue
that, once the behavioristic approach is taken with regard to both
signs and symbols, they may indeed be considered as compara-
ble and not fundamentally distinct means through which
behavior may be informed in different degrees of reliability. To
take signs as related to dispositions of behavior is to be primarily
interested in the modes in which they come to inform, incite,
appraise, or direct action. To emphasize signs in their symbolic
use is to inquire not so much into what they "announce," "ap-
praise," etc., but into their "meaning," the "domain of objec-
tivity" they appear to condition. An inquiry into the symbolic
function of signs, as Cassirer puts it,
is not concerned with what we see in a certain perspective, but (with)
the perspective itself ... [so that] the special symbolic forms are not
imitations, but organs of reality, since it is solely by their agency that
anything real becomes an object for intellectual apprehension and as
such is made visible to us. The question as to what reality is apart from
these forms, and what are its independent attributes, becomes irrelevant
here. 19
Cassirer insists, in other words, that the truly symbolic (the
17 Susanne K. Langer, Philosophy in a New Key, 61.
18 Charles W. Morris, Signs, Language and Behavior > 50.
19 Language and Myth, translated by S. Langer, 8.
84 CARL H. HAMBURG
properly "significative") meaning of sign- functions cannot be
looked for in the indicative office performed by them, but refers
to their role as "organs of reality" as which they are said to
"bring about" (condition) what is meant by an "object" in the
various universes of discourse, intuition, and expression.
In accordance with three senses in which the symbolic-form
concept is used (see above), to say that "the symbolic forms
are . . . organs of reality" would be equivalent to the following
three expressions of the thesis:
1 i ) No meaning can be assigned to any object outside the cul-
tural (mythical, artistic, common-sensical, scientific) contexts
in which it is apprehended, understood, or known.
(2) No meaning can be assigned to any object except in refer-
ence to the pervasive symbolic-relation types of space, time,
cause and number which "constitute" objectivity in all domains,
with the modifications characteristic of the media listed under
<'>
(3) No meaning can be assigned to any object without, in
whatever form, assuming a representative relationship ex-
pressed in the symbol-concept which, abstractable from any
context, would be said to hold between given "sensuous"
moments, on the one hand, and a (in principle) non-senuous
"sense" moment, on the other.
How, we must ask now, is both the pervasiveness and the
objectifying office of the symbolic- form concept to be demon-
strated? Keeping Cassirer's Kantian orientation in mind, it will
follow that his inquiry into the objectifying pervasiveness of
symbols cannot properly be expected to point to or to discover
facts or activities hitherto unknown or inaccessible to either the
sciences or such other culturally extant types of experience-
accounting as religion, myths, the arts. Kant, it will be re-
membered, set out to clarify his "misunderstood" Kritik by
demonstrating in the Prolegomena that neither mathematics
nor the physical sciences would be "possible" unless the pure
forms of intuition and certain categorial determinations were
presupposed as valid for all experience. Analogously, Cassirer
maintains that the symbol-concept must be taken as just as
pervasive as are, in fact, the sciences, arts, myths, and languages
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 85
of common sense, all of which may be conceived as employing
symbols in their respective experience-accountings. To say,
furthermore, that symbols "objectify" would, on this interpre-
tation, mean nothing else than that these various domains
themselves, in their symbolic evaluation of the perceptive data
to which they apply, furnish the only contexts within which
one can meaningfully speak of any kind of "objectivity." There
is, in other words, no point in producing examples to illustrate
what exactly Cassirer means when he credits symbols with
"bringing about" rather than merely "indicating" objects,
simply because all sciences, arts, myths, etc. would have to be
taken as illustrating this general contention. We must distin-
guish here two aspects of this contention: (i) That all the
above-listed "domains of objectivity" do indeed presuppose
the employment of symbols, and (2) That there is no objec-
tivity outside the contexts established by these various domains.
As regards the latter aspect, its acceptance follows from
Cassirer's endorsement of what he took to be Kant's trans-
cendental method. Could Kant prove the adequacy of this
method by the use he made of it with respect to "experience as
science?" The answer may be in the affirmative, if one keeps in
mind the state of the mathematical and physical disciplines with
which he was familiar. As a contemporary writer has put it: "In
relation to his information Kant's intuition of Euclid's axioms
is unobjectionable. . . . Without the aid of Einstein's conception
of a curved physical space, we should not conclude that Kant
is altogether wrong." 20 The answer may be in the negative, if
one considers that Kant presented his "forms" of intuition and
understanding as immutable human faculties, and took them to
be as final as Aristotelian logic, Euclidean geometry, and New-
tonian physics were thought to be necessary. But, whatever be
one's evaluation of Kant's position, this much of it is never
questioned by Cassirer, namely that the determinateness with
which we experience the "objective" world is never passively
received ab extra, but that it is, in principle, analyzable as
"conditioned" by acts of synthesizing the manifold given in per-
20 Andrew P. Ushenko, Power and Events, xv.
86 CARL H. HAMBURG
ception. What Kant had maintained was that there can be no
objectivity in the physical sense without assumption of the
synthesizing forms laid down by the Transcendental Analytic.
This point is generalized by Cassirer to include other than
physical domains, to be accounted for by types of synthesis
other than those listed in the first Kritik. That aspect of Cas-
sirer's general contention, then, according to which there can
be no objectivity outside the contexts established by the sciences,
arts, myths, etc., instead of being explicitly demonstrated,
constitutes his basic philosophical commitment to Kant's view-
point.
Regarding the other aspect of his thesis, viz., that all the
contexts within which such objectivity is encountered, are to
be taken as sign-systems, in so far as all of them imply specific
evaluations of the "same" sensory data, on what evidence are
we to accept it? Or better: what sort of evidence is possible for
this contention within the commitment to Kant's position as
indicated? With respect to Kant's inquiry it is maintained by
Cassirer that he aimed to develop the epistemological conse-
quences from the facts of the sciences with which he was fa-
miliar. It was their actual employment of "judgments" both
related to experience (synthetic) and yet necessary (a priori)
which seemed to Kant to demand a revision of both the
empiricist and the rationalist pronouncements with respect to
the character of human knowledge. In the stage at which he
analyzed it, it could be said that his analysis was adequate for
science as he knew it. Kant, in other words, was not concerned
with adducing evidence that there are synthetic judgments a
priori the evidence for their actual employment being taken
to issue from an impartial examination of the sciences them-
selves. It was but their "possibility" that Kant felt had to be
accounted for by making those necessary presuppositions about
human cognition through mediation of which science as a re-
sult of the activation of that cognition would become intelligi-
ble. Consequently, these presuppositions, the forms of intuition
and understanding, are not the evidence from which the syn-
thetic a priori judgments of the scientist are thought to be
derivable, but the sciences themselves are taken as the evidence
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 87
that justifies and postulates the epistemological characterization
of the "mind" with which the first Kritik is concerned.
This brief reminder serves to explain Cassirer's analogous
conviction that his theory of the symbolically-mediate character
of reality, far from standing in need of ingenious philosophical
demonstrations, merely formulates, on a level of highest gen-
erality, a semiotic function which, in various modifications, is
assumed as a matter of fact by all who, within the legitimate
contexts of their respective branches of investigation, inquire
into the nature of physical, artistic, religious, and perceptual
"objects." A re-examination of this evidence in the light of
more recent developments in the mathematical, physical, psy-
chological, linguistic, religious and anthropological researches
considered by Cassirer, would be both surpassing the compe-
tency of one inquirer and not be to the immediate purpose.
For the remainder of this section, it will be our chief concern
to elucidate how the symbol-concept must be understood in
order to warrant the universal use and significance which
Cassirer attributes to it. Before proceeding to this task, however,
note that rightfully or not Cassirer did take for granted its
actual employment, not just in the analysis of the various
disciplines, but in the very construction of the domains to which
these analyses refer. In support of this contention, we point to
the following:
(i) Early in the first volume of the Philosofhie der sym-
bolischen Formen y where Cassirer prepares for the introduction
of the symbolic-form concept, he raises the question ". . .
whether there is indeed for the manifold directions of the
spirit ... a mediating function, and whether, if so, this function
has any typical characteristics by means of which it can be
known and described." 21 Yet, although it is a foregone con-
clusion that such a "mediating function" must be ascribed to
the symbol-concept, Cassirer, instead of presenting specific
arguments for this core idea, immediately goes on to say: "We
go back for an answer to this question to the symbol-concept as
Heinrich Herz has postulated and characterized it from the
point of view of physical knowledge." (ibid.) As soon as the
11 PSF, Vol. 1, 1 6.
88 CARL H. HAMBURG
question is raised, in other words, whether there is a function
both more general and flexible than, e.g., the concepts of
"spirit" and "reason," elaborated by traditional philosophy, the
answer, in the form of the proposed symbol-concept, is not
argued for at all but is presented as being actually effective and
recognized as such by Herz with respect to physical science,
and such other thinkers as Hilbert (mathematical logic), Hum-
boldt (comparative linguistics), Helmholtz (physiological
optics), and Herder (religion and poetry).
(2) In 1936, the Swedish philosopher Konrad Marc-Wogau
had commented upon certain difficulties he found inherent in
Cassirer's various versions of the symbol-concept. In a re-
joinder to these objections, Cassirer makes this very character-
istic statement: "In his criticism, Marc-Wogau seems to have
overlooked this one point, namely that the reflections to which
he objects, are in no way founded upon purely speculative con-
siderations but that they are actually related to specific, concrete
problems and to concrete matters of fact." 22 It is significant that,
here again, where the "logic of the symbol-concept" has been
challenged, Cassirer makes no attempt to take up his critic's
suggestions on the same analytical level on which they were
made, but, instead, goes on to cite a variety of instances (drawn
from psychology, linguistics, mathematics, and physics) for
which outstanding representatives have emphasized the sym-
bolical character of their respective subject-matters.
Strange as this attitude may appear to those who would ex-
pect an original philosophy to develop and reason from its own
axioms, it is only consistent in the light of the above-mentioned
transcendental orientation in which Cassirer read and accepted
Kant. The thesis, accordingly, that the mind (Bewusstsein,
Geist) is symbolically active in the construction of all its uni-
verses of perception and discourse is not suggested as a dis-
covery to be made by or to be grounded upon specifically philo-
sophical arguments. Instead of presupposing insights different
from and requiring cognitive powers or techniques superior to
those accessible to empirical science, the thesis is developed as
iat (Tidskrift for Filosofi och Psykologi.) II, 158.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 89
issuing from an impartial reading of the scientific evidence in all
branches of investigation.
Certain difficulties about such a position could perhaps be
felt from the outset. It may be questioned, for instance, whether
scientific situations could be encountered at any time which
would give univocal testimony to the symbolically-mediate
character of both their methods and their subject-matters. One
may also wonder whether the scientific crown-witnesses (on
whom Cassirer relies so heavily), when reflecting upon the
symbolic nature of their domains, do so qua scientists, or
whether, when so reflecting, they must be considered philo-
sophical rather than scientific spokesmen for their disciplines.
Finally, a philosophy resting its case squarely on the evidence of
not just one (especially reliable) science, but of all the sciences
including all religious and imaginative sense-making as
within the province of what Cassirer calls "Kulturwissen-
schajten" seems dangerously committed to generalize upon
enterprises notorious for their proneness to scrap both their own
theories and attendant philosophical explanations of their
theories.
Considerations of this type need not be fatal, however, to
a philosophy thus far considered. A philosophical reading of
the evidence of the sciences will indeed not face "univocal situa-
tions." Nor will such situations be encountered within any
other inquiry. The cognitive enterprise, whether in the form
of large philosophical generalizations, or of the more readily
controlled scientific generalizations, is admittedly guided by
hypotheses and thus does imply decisions with respect to the data
that are considered relevant for their respective generalizations.
The further contention that the methodological testimony of
the scientists cannot be credited with the same respectability as
his methodological effectiveness also need not be damaging to a
philosophy whose center of gravity is determined by the scien-
tist's findings. Any philosophy, one could say, which is pro-
posed as a critique and mediation of symbolisms, must obviously
do justice to the most reliably constructed symbol-systems of
the sciences and, in doing that, it can hardly afford to disregard
the statements on method merely because they come from some-
90 CARL H. HAMBURG
body who employs them successfully. At any rate, an adequate
interpretation of the scientific symbolisms always requires atten-
tion to both the factual and the (methodo-) logical subject-
matters, and there does not seem to be any Qrima -facie evidence
why the method-conscious scientist is to be trusted less in this
connection than the science-versed philosopher. The objection,
finally, that any philosophy whose ambition it is to bring into
conformity its account of "reality" with the latest results of
the sciences is doomed to "eternalize" highly contingent
validity-claims, need likewise not endanger the position taken
by Cassirer. It would be the alternative to the self-corrective
character of the evidence trusted by him that would be fatal to
any philosophy. The ambition to make final pronouncements,
to issue once-and-for-all "truths/' is certainly not germane to a
thought-system which, by Kantian orientation, is not straining
to lay hold upon a final reality-structure, but which is advanced
frankly as an attempt to discharge the "culture-mission" of
mediating the reality-accounts offered by the various cultural
disciplines.
We must conclude therefore: the thesis that all contexts (in
which we objectively have a world, structure, domain of
reality) may be analyzed as differently oriented symbolic evalu-
ations of the perceptive data, is offered as evidenced by all the
inquiries made of these contexts. As such, the thesis is sug-
gested as a generalization upon the pervasive features of the
artistic, religious, and scientific domains, guided by Kant's
transcendental hypothesis that the pervasive features of all
experience cannot be prior to and independent of the synthesiz-
ing activities of a symbol-minded consciousness which has and
reflects upon them.
What Cassirer never tires of attributing to Kant is the latter's
"Revolution der Denkart y " by which philosophers were freed
from having to attain a reality more profound (or more im-
mediate) than the only one given in experience, either as en-
countered or as reflected upon by the only valid methods of
scientific synthesizing. Instead of undertaking in the fashion
of ontological metaphysics to determine fixed traits of being,
the transcendental method would bid us to examine the types
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 91
of judgments which logically condition whatever may validly
be asserted as "objective." The "objectivity," however, with
which the first Kritik furnishes us, actually turns out to be an
exclusively "physical" one. The transcendental method, as used
in the Kritik, has not provided us Cassirer thinks with the
clue for "Objektivitat uberhauyt" but specifically with just
one type of objectivity, viz., the one that may be formulated
within the system of principles constitutive of Newtonian
physics. 23
In brief: what Cassirer accepts of Kant is the transcendental
method which, instead of revealing immutable structures of
Being, inquires into the culturally given "fact" of science and,
"being concerned not with objects but with our mode of know-
ing objects," 24 makes for a more flexible analysis of experience
by allowing for different types of "objectivity," comprehended
as corresponding to different "modes of knowing." In Cassirer's
version: "The decisive question is always whether we attempt to
understand function in terms of structure or vice versa. . , . The
basic principle of all critical thinking the principle of the pri-
macy of the function before the object assumes a new form in
each discipline and requires a new foundation." 28 Cassirer's
position implies both an acceptance of Kant's methodological
strictures and a demand for a wider application of the "critical
method." More specifically: Kant's method was to limit the
philosopher's concern to an elucidation of the mode of knowing
governing "reality" as scientifically accessible. It was, in conse-
quence, to deny him the right of engaging in ontological pur-
suits, i.e., to discover or construct "realities," offered as "meta-
physical," apprehension of which would involve an employment
of cognitive powers superior to those certified by the first
Kritik as "constitutive" of (or regulative for) experience, i.e.,
of science as the only legitimate inquiry through which the
permanent structure of this experience may be known.
23 We are concerned here merely with Kant's attempt to formulate his "Grund-
satze" in conformity with Newtonian physics, not with the success of this attempt.
On this point, see A. Pap: The Afriori in Physical Theory, Pt. II. King's Crown
Press, 1946.
a< Immanuel Kant, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, "Einleitung," Par. VII.
92 CARL H. HAMBURG
If then the philosopher qua cognitor, not qua moralizer
was to be restricted to an examination of the source, scope and
validity of the "mode of knowing" that makes possible experi-
ence as science, or if, in Cassirer's extended version, he is to be
restricted to an examination of all the various modes of knowing
and comprehending that make possible experience, however
structured (as science, or myth, art, religion, or common sense),
the issue of highest philosophical universality will logically arise
as one of attempting to reduce the variety of such distinguish-
able modes to so many comparable instances of one fundamental
function. And such a function would at once have to be general
enough to characterize all modes of knowing and comprehend-
ing through which experience is realized as structured, and yet
permit of all the differentiations that specifically modify the
various cultural media for which it must account. Now, it is
Cassirer's contention that, historically, philosophy both aimed
and fell short of elaborating principles of such high generality
that would, on the one hand, be valid for all domains and, on
the other, be susceptible of modifications characteristic of the
specific differences distinguishing these domains. Before turning
to a closer examination of the symbol-concept which, Cassirer
believes, satisfies the requirements of such a universal yet
modifiable function, it is significant to note here that Cassirer
conceives of his own efforts as within the general direction of
what philosophers, with varying degrees of awareness and suc-
cess, have always striven for. In this connection, Cassirer has
spoken of both the "culture-mission" of philosophy and the
"antinomies of the culture-concept." By the latter, reference is
made to the characteristic conflicts that arise as the various
cultural media of religion,, art, language, and science tend to set
off their special domains by claiming superiority of insight for
their respective perspectives. Thus, although the first cosmo-
logical and physical scientists everywhere started out from the
distinctions and discriminations made by common sense and
reflected by language, they soon opposed to this basic fund of
accumulated knowledge specifically new principles of division,
a new "logos 33 from the vantage-point of which all non-scientific
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 93
knowledge appeared as a mere distortion of "the truth. " Simil-
arly, while both art and religion in their early stages developed
closely together, if not at times in actual interpenetration,
further development of these two cultural media resulted in
either of them claiming superior vision and closer approxima-
tion to the "really real" as over against the other. Instead of
contenting themselves with the specific insights which they
afford, the various cultural disciplines tend Cassirer points out
to impose the characteristic form of their interpretation upon
the totality of being, and it is from this tendency towards the
"absolute," inherent in each one of them, that there issue the con-
flicts that Cassirer considers "antinominal" within the culture-
concept. Yet, although it is in intellectual conflicts of this type
that one would expect philosophy, as a reflection on the highest
level of universality, to mediate among the various claims, the
different "dogmatic systems of metaphysics satisfy this expecta-
tion and demand only imperfectly} they themselves are im-
mersed in this struggle and do not stand above it." 26 Upon
analysis, it is suggested, most philosophical systems turn out
to be merely so many hypostatizations of a particular logical,
ethical, esthetical, or religious orientation.
We have briefly adduced these considerations because it is
against their background that one can understand the impor-
tance Cassirer attributes to his own "philosophy of symbolic
forms," which is presented as having a chance of succeeding
where all former "systems" could only failj not in the sense,
to be sure, that it holds the key to all the problems that have or
will come up, but in the sense, nevertheless, that with the
symbol-concept it puts at the philosopher's disposal an intel-
lectual instrument of greatest universality and modifiability. As
such, it is commended as impartially comprehending all "do-
mains of reality" as of a determinable, symbolically-mediate
type for which philosophical analysis may indicate their specific
modalities of sign-functioning, instead of super-imposing one
privileged modality of meaning (logical, esthetic, ethical, etc.)
with respect to which all other "visions" are reduced to mere
*PSF,VoL I, 13.
94 CARL H. HAMBURG
approximations and appearances (at best), or illusions (at
worst).
c. Exposition of the Symbol-Concept
We have considered so far the epistemological setting within
which Cassirer's thesis is developed. We have listed what, we
believe, represent three essentially distinct senses in which the
symbolic-form concept is employed, and we have contrasted it
from both the usually agreed upon view, according to which
knowledge-as-mediate is indeed taken as "symbolical," and
from the more current behavioristic position, according to which
the pervasive character of sign-situations is interpretable as in-
volving objects which as signs indicate the presence (or the
conditions for the realization of the presence) of other objects-
as-signified. We have then attempted to render meaningful
Cassirer's contradistinction from this position by stressing that
his concern is with symbols, taken not as "indications" but as
"organs of reality." Interpreting "organs of reality" in a sense
termed "transcendental" by Kant, we could say that Cassirer's
type of inquiry constitutes a most erudite attempt to provide
evidence for the thesis that no empirical "reality" (objectivity,
structure) can be meaningfully referred to except under the
implicit presupposition of the symbolic (constitutive) "forms"
of space, time, cause, number, etc. and the symbolic (cultural)
"forms" of myth, common sense (language), art, and science,
which furnish the contexts (Sinnzusammenhange) within which
alone "reality" is both encounterable and accountable.
We must now examine more closely exactly what is asserted
when it is said of the constitutive and cultural "forms" which
condition "reality," however accounted, that they are "sym-
bolical." For this purpose, let us go back to the already stated
definition of the symbol-concept, according to which "it is to
cover the totality of all those phenomena which exhibit in what-
ever form 'sense in the senses' (Sinnerfiillung im Sinnlicheri)
and all contexts in which something 'sensuous* by being what
it is (in der Art seines Da-Seins und So-Seins} is represented
as a particular embodiment as a manifestation and incarnation
of a meaning." 27 According to this passage, the symbol-concept
"PSF, Vol. Ill, 109.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 95
would apply to all contexts in which a "sensuous" moment may
be distinguished from a "sense" moment, with the proviso
that a relation holds with respect to these two terms which is
most frequently referred to as "one representing the other."
For Cassirer (as for most other philosophers) the term "senses"
covers all perceptual cues which such as colors, sounds, etc.
suffice to act as vehicles for any and all meaning, where "mean-
ing" covers all the embodiments to which the senses are amen-
able as related to an interpreter of these cues, i.e., to the full
complexity of perspectives which the term "interpreter" (Gei$t y
Bewusstsein) suggests. To realize yet more distinctly what both
the "senses" and the "sense" (meaning) connote in this defini-
tion, we must attempt further to clarify the relation that is sup-
posed to hold between the two terms, if they are to function
symbolically. This relation, we suggest, is taken by Cassirer
both in a polar and a correlative sense.
( i ) The polarity of "sense" and "senses."
Stressing the polarity of this relation, Cassirer states suc-
cinctly that "the symbolic function is composed of moments
which are different in principle. No genuine meaning (Sinn) as
such is simple, but it is one and double and this polarity, which
is intrinsic to it, does not tear it asunder and destroy it, but
instead represents its proper function." 28
This function, we may say, establishes a relation between the
"senses" as signs and the "sense" as signified by them in
such a way that these two terms must be conceived as polar,
opposite and (potentially, if not actually) distinguishable from
each other. This polar distinction of the two symbol-moments,
as maintained by Cassirer, can be read from a variety of pro-
nouncements made by him apropos the three modal forms,
termed respectively: the expression-function (Ausdrucksfank-
tiori)\ the intuition-function (Anschauungsjunktion) and the
and the conceptual-function (reine Bedeutungsjunktion). Space
forbids even a selective reproduction of the illustrative material
offered by Cassirer. The gist of the matter will be intelligible,
however, if the following points are kept in mind.
*PSF, Vol. Ill, 1 10.
96 CARL H. HAMBURG
a. If the representative relation between the senses and their
sense is of an expressive type (of which myth, art, and the reali-
zation of "persons" are taken as instances), "reality" is had as
a universe of "characters," with all events in it having physiog-
nomic traits and all manifestation of sense through the senses
being restricted to what is expressible in terms of man's emotive,
affective (evaluational) system. Where the "world," in other
words, is taken in its primary expression-values, all of its phe-
nomena manifest a specific character which belongs to them in an
immediate and spontaneous fashion. Cassirer's description of
these "expression-phenomena" as "being inherently sombre or
cheerful, exciting or appeasing, frightening or reassuring" 29
parallels Dewey's account, e.g., according to which "empiri-
cally, things are poignant, tragic, settled, disturbed . . . are such
immediately and in their own right and behalf . . . any quality
is at once initial and terminal." 30 It would therefore be a mis-
reading of what Cassirer terms the "reine Ausdrucksphaenom-
ene" if they were taken to issue from secondary acts of inter-
pretation, as products of an act of "empathy." The basic error
of such an "explanation" would consist in the fact that it re-
verses the order of what is phenomenally given. This interpre-
tation "must kill the character of perception, it must reduce it
to a mere complex of sensory data of impression in order to then
revive the dead matter of impression by an act of empathy." 31
What is overlooked in the empathy-theories is that, in order to
get at the sensory data (the hot and cold, the hard and soft, the
colors, sounds, etc.), we must already disregard and abstract
from the expressive "Urfhaenomene?* in which a "world" is
had prior to the working out of the various representative
schemes and conceptual frameworks to which it subsequently
submits. What typifies an expression-phenomenon, we conclude,
is that, whereas it possesses specific (immediate, non-derivative)
meanings not realized on the perceptual level as distinct
from the sensuous vehicles with which they go "hand in hand,"
it must still be recognized as an instance of a symbolic function,
, Vol. Ill, 85.
30 Experience and Nature, 96.
n PSF, Vol. Ill, 85.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 97
in so far as subsequent analysis, on the level of reflection, will
make what Cassirer considers a "polar distinction" between its
two constitutive moments which, as the sign (senses) and the
signified (sense) define that function.
b. The polarity between these two moments is encountered
in a more developed form in the intuitive mode of the symbolic
function, for which a perception is not merely taken as a qualita-
tive presence (Praesenz) but as a cue for the representation of
something else.
The construction of our perceptive world begins with such acts of divid-
ing up the ever-flowing series of sensuous phenomena. In the midst of
this steady flux of phenomena there are retained certain determinate
(perceptive) units which, from now on, serve as fixed centers of orien-
tation. The particular phenomenon could not have any characteristic
meaning except if thus referred to those centers. All further progress of
objective knowledge, all clarification and determination of our percep-
tive world depends upon this ever progressing development. 32
The passage from the expression-mode to the intuition-mode
of "making sense in the senses" is described by Cassirer as a de-
velopment in which progressively an organization of the sensory
flux is brought about by singling out certain data, realized as
comparatively constant, significant or relevant for action, by
operating, in brief, a division of the perceptually given into
"presentative" and "representative" moments. 83 Now, the
selective and organizing office of sensory perception has been
noted by both scientists and philosophers for some time. If a
symbolic interpretation is put upon whatever evidence exists for
this fact, it is because such "selectivity" entails a distinction of
the constant from the variable, of the necessary from the con-
tingent, of the general from the particular, distinctions, in
brief, which, for Cassirer, "imply the very source of all objecti-
fication." 34 And it is to language that we are referred as both
the outstanding agency which establishes the basic objectifying
distinctions and the medium which reflects the "foci of atten-
"PSF,Vol. Ill, 165.
88 This, of course, is a metaphorical, not a genetic account. A "flux" prior to
any and all "organization" is a contrary-to-fact abstraction,
"PSF, Vol. Ill, 1 80.
98 CARL H. HAMBURG
tion," the "perspectives" which condition whatever discrimina-
tion is exercised when some (rather than other) perceptions are
taken to "represent" the quasi-permanent units as which, on the
intuition-mode, we have the world as organized in spatio-
temporal "things-with-properties." Skipping at this point
further consideration of the evidence adduced by Cassirer for
this view, 85 what matters for the present purpose is that the
intuition-mode of symbolic representation is conceived as in-
volving, besides the sensory data, an "original mode of sight"
(eine eigene Weise der Sicht) and that both these moments are
said to stand in a polar relationship to each other in so far as the
"sight," the "perspective," as something posited (em Seteungs-
modus), is not reducible to or constructible from the sensory
data which it "sees." Cassirer argues in this connection against
both rationalist and empiricist epistemologies which, regardless
how differently they provide answers to the question of the
"relation of our perceptions to an object," take the same basic
course in explaining this relation either in terms of "associa-
tions" and "reproductions" or in terms of judgments and "un-
conscious inferences." "What is overlooked in either approach
is the circumstance that all psychological or logical processes to
which one has recourse come rather too late. . . . No associative
connection of them can explain that original Setzungsmodus,
according to which an impression (taken representatively)
stands for something 'objective'." 36 The intuition-mode of the
symbol function is proposed therefore as both an original and
ultimate mode of sight which, although inseparable from the
sensory impressions which it sees y must be distinguished from
them as sharply as the dimensions of "meaning" (sense) from
the dimension of "signs" (senses).
c. The polar relation between the sensuous- and the sense-
moments is even more readily realized in Cassirer's discussion
of the theoretical mode of the symbol function. Within this
88 In his Die Sprache und der Aufbau der Gegenstandswelt, Jena, 1932 (sec
Bibliography for translations) . Also in the Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen,
Language and Myth> and "The Concept of Group and the Theory of Perception,"
(Journal of Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. V, 1944, 1-35.)
86 PSF, Vol. Ill, 148.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 99
dimension, also referred to as the "level of cognition," there
obtains, as within the expression- and the intuition-modes, an
organization and determination of sensory data, with this dif-
ference, however, that now "the moments which condition the
order and structure of the perceptual world are grasped as such
and recognized in their specific significance. The relations which,
on the former levels, were established implicitly (in der Form
blosser Mitgegebenheit) are now explicated." 37
This "explication," proceeding by way of an abstractive iso-
lation of the relations which, while applicable to perception,
are, in principle, of a non-perceptual character, is evidenced,
"writ large" so to speak, in the constructive schemata, the con-
ventional systems of conventional signs by mediation of which
scientific knowledge is attained. A considerably detailed demon-
stration of this thesis was given by Cassirer long before the
development of his philosophy of symbolic forms. His con-
tention that all scientific concept-formation is definable as an
ever more precise application of relational thinking was first
presented in his influential Substanzbegriff und Funktionsbe-
griff (1910) and reasserted in the concluding sections of his
"Phaenomenologie der Erkenntnis" (PSF, Vol. III.) where
recent developments (until 1929) of the mathematical and
physical sciences are considered in confirmation of this thesis.
What is established by the scientific concept is referred to vari-
ously as a "function," a "principle," a "law of a series," a "rule"
or "form," where all these terms are employed with the same
connotation which his early work had given them, i.e., as ex-
pressing relations between (terms designating) phenomena.
"To 'comprehend conceptually' and to 'establish relations' turn
out upon closer logical and epistemological analysis to be
always correlative notions." 38 Instead of defining the concept
as extensively determining a class, having members, it is main-
tained that theoretical concepts
always contain reference to an exact serial principle that enables us to
connect the manifold of intuition in a definite way, and to run through it
"PSF, Vol. Ill, 3 30.
"PSF, Vol. Ill, 346.
ioo CARL H. HAMBURG
according to a prescribed law. . . . (Thus) no insuperable gap can arise
between the 'universal' and the 'particular,' because the universal itself
has no other meaning and purpose than to represent and to render
possible the connection and order of the particular. If we regard the
particular as a serial member and the universal as a serial principle,
it is at once clear that the two moments, without going over into each
other and in any way being confused, still refer throughout in their
function to each other. 39
The symbolic function, implied in the theoretical mode, becomes
comparable to both the expression- and intuition-modes in that
here too we are bidden to distinguish between the "principle of
the series" and the "manifold" ordered into the members of the
series.
Let us put this polarity into the language of symbolic logic.
If we are to define the meaning of a concept not extensionally
(by specification of the members that are subsumed) but in
terms of a prepositional function p(x), we are clearly desig-
nating two distinguishable moments.
The general form of the functions designated by the letter C 0' is to be
sharply contrasted with the values of the variable V which may enter
this function as c true' values. The function determines the relation of
these values, but it is not itself one of them: the C 0' of C 0(x)' is not
homogenous to the xi, X2, Xs, etc. [Both the function and the values of
the variables belong to an entirely different conceptual type (Denk-
And this formulation only throws into relief the distinctness of
the two moments which, as the principle (form) of the series
and its members (material) are held to define all theoretical
(conceptual) symbolisms. The distinctive trait of theoretical
concept-formation must, accordingly, be sought in the elabora-
tion of distinctive "points of view" which, as "principles" or
"forms" determine the selection of the perceptually given mani-
fold into specifically ordered series. In this connection, Cassirer
argues against certain empiricist doctrines which regard the
"similarity" of the intuitively apprehended phenomena as a
39 Substance and Function (Swabey tr.), 223^
*PSF 9 VoL III, 349-350.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 101
self-evident psychological fact, fit to account for the serial re-
lations established by concepts. But, as he points out,
the similarity of certain elements can only be spoken of significantly when
a certain point of view has been established from which the elements can
be designated as like or unlike. The difference between these contents,
on the one hand, and the conceptual species by which we unify them,
on the other, is an irreducible ]act$ it is categorial and belongs to the
form of consciousness. 41
It designates, as we have seen, the polar contrast between the
members of a series and the form of the series.
(2) The correlativity of "sense" and "senses."
Above, we have considered a number of passages indicative
of Cassirer's conviction that on all levels on which we, symboli-
cally, have a world, be it as organized in qualitative expres-
sion-characters, be it as "broken" into spatio-temporally ordered
"things-with-properties," be it in the relational order-systems
of the sciences, we are always in a position to make a dis-
tinctio rationis" between the "sight" (die Sicht; the form of a
manifold) and the sensory data that are variously determinable
within these different sights. We have treated of this conviction
as implying an interpretation of polarity between the two mo-
ments of the symbol function. We must now qualify this char-
acterization by pointing out that, in another sense (to be
specified), both moments are taken as correlative to a degree
that makes it inconceivable to refer to or define either moment
except under implicit presupposition of the other. If, in agree-
ment with Cassirer's actual usage, we call the perceptive mani-
fold the "matter" of the symbolic function and the sense-
perspective (Sinn-Persfektive) its "form," we are bidden to
think of these terms as correlative in such a way that it is not
only impossible in any actual context to separate one from
the other, but also to assign any meaning to either term without
implication of the meaning of the other.
Our problem here makes contact with the metaphysical con-
troversy about universals. From what has been said so far about
41 Substance and Function, 25.
CARL H. HAMBURG
the relation between the "form" and "matter" of a series, there
can be no doubt that Cassirer could not, without qualifications,
have subscribed to either the realist or the nominalist position.
Partial agreement is indicated with St. Thomas, 42 whom he
credits with having maintained a "strict correlation, a mutual
relationship between the general and the particular." 43 What
attracts him in this version is the fact that it is free from the
various space- and time-metaphorical separations that have
traditionally been assumed to characterize the universal as be-
ing before or after, within or outside the particular. Cassirer's
insistence that no meaning can be given to the universal "form"
independently of a "matter" for which it is valid, is reasserted in
a number of ways, such as, e.g., the "sight" determining the
"how"-character of "what" is seen, or the "principle of a series"
exhausting its meaning in the order it establishes among the mem-
bers of the series, or the "p" of a prepositional function not be-
ing definable independently of the variables for which it holds. 44
Now, it has been suggested that Cassirer's thought here is not
free from contradiction on the grounds that the two moments
by which he aims to define the symbol-concept cannot both:
(a) belong to two entirely different dimensions and (b) yet be
tied together in such close correlation that the definition of one
could not be given except in terms of the other. These objections
were voiced by the Swedish philosopher Marc-Wogau. 45 It is
to these objections that we must now give some attention, before
considering Cassirer's defense in the sequel.
d. The Symbol-Concept. Objections and Defense
Marc-Wogau writes:
A closer examination seems to me to lead to the result that the positive
meaning of Cassirer's "symbolic relation" is of a dialectical character;
the symbolic relation, as conceived by Cassirer, covers both the idea of
an opposition between the sensuously given (the sign) on the one hand,
48 "Universalia non sunt res subsistentes, sed habent esse solum in singularibus."
Contra Gentiles , Lib. I, 165.
48 /W, Vol. Ill, 351.
44 On this point, see also B. Russell, Principles of Mathematics, 85.
48 In: Theoria (Tidskrift for Filosofi och Psykologi, 1936), 279-332,
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 103
and the " Sinner juettunff* (the signified) on the other, and also the idea
of an identity between the two. The first idea is clearly asserted by
Cassirer, the second issues as a consequence from certain of his definitions
and assertions. 46
Now, the second idea concerns the correlativity of the two
symbol-moments which, according to Marc-Wogau, entails
their identity as a consequence. Let us follow his reasoning:
'Sign' and 'Signified' ... are to be mutually conditioned by each other
in their determinate character. One moment has meaning only in re-
lation to the other. But that implies that the thought about the one term
involves the thought about the other. If the one term is being thought
of, the other is thereby being thought of too. The two moments of the
relation would, in consequence, coincide. If A and B are to be connected
in such a way that A can be determined only with reference to B and
B can be determined only in reference to A, it becomes impossible to
distinguish A and B : they coincide (zusammen] alien) . 4T
With respect to another characterizatioin of the symbol by Cas-
sirer, according to which it is said to be "immanence" and
"transcendence" in one: in so far as it expresses a meaning
non-intuitive in principle in an intuitive form," 48 Marc-Wogau
remarks:
In this definition, two moments are distinguished which are related in
a specific way. When Cassirer characterizes this relation by saying that
"the symbol is not 'the one or the other,' but that it represents the 'one
in the other' and 'the other in the one,' " the question seems to crop up
how, under such circumstances, a possible distinction between the 'one'
and the 'other' could even be made. By this definition is there not
posited an identity between the two moments of the symbolic relation
which would conflict with the insistence upon their polarity? 49
In Cassirer's rejoinder to these objections, 50 at least two
different lines of argumentation may be distinguished. For one,
considerations are adduced, designed to render questionable
441 Theoria, (1936), 291.
47 Theoria, (1936), 292.
48 PSF, Vol. Ill, 447-
* w'**> v*yjw/, 33 1.
60 In Theoria, (1938)1 '45-'75.
104 CARL H. HAMBURG
Marc-Wogau's belief that there are logical grounds on which
the maintained correlativity of the two symbol-moments could
be refuted. Furthermore, illustrations from empirical sciences
are reproduced for the purpose of supporting his contention that
the two symbol-moments (although correlative) cannot only
still be distinguished, but purporting to show that and how such
isolation of the two moments has been accomplished. In this
connection, Cassirer quotes extensively from contemporary re-
search into color and acoustical phenomena which are presented
by him as documenting as a fact what Marc-Wogau had denied
as a possibility.
( i ) The logical issue.
Marc-Wogau's objection that, if two terms of a relation are
thought of as "mutually determined," they will, of necessity,
also be identical, is countered by Cassirer's reference to the
actual employment of "implicit definitions" in modern mathe-
matical logic. Now, implicit definitions may be defined as "de-
noting anything whatsoever provided that what they denote
conforms to the stated relations between themselves," 51 where
the stating of the relations is presumably to be given within the
axiom-system selected. With the discovery of non-Euclidean
geometries, Cassirer remarks, it became increasingly clear to
those concerned with their logical foundation, that their ele-
ments the points, lines, angles, etc. could not be defined
anymore in the explicit way in which Euclid could take them as
intuitively evident. "Neither the basic elements, nor the basic
relations could have been defined, if by a definition one under-
stands the indication of the 'genus *proximmn? and of the 'dif-
ferentia specified."* 2 A way out, Cassirer suggests, was opened
by Pasch's investigations 53 which were continued and brought to
a systematic conclusion with Hilbert's Grundlagen der Geomet-
rie.** Hilbert's analyses, of considerable influence upon the
development of mathematical logic, may be summarized by
saying that, for him, the geometrical elements and relations are
51 Cohen and Nagel, An Introduction to Logic and Scientific Method, 135.
K Theoria, 169.
88 See Substance and Function, 101.
"ibid., 93 .
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 105
not to be taken as independent entities, intuitively grasped, for
which ^xplicit definitions could be given, but as terms whose
meaning is specified by the relations which are axiomatically
prescribed for them. "The axioms which they satisfy determine
and exhaust their essence." 55 Basic geometrical concepts are,
accordingly, held to be only implicitly definable, i.e., within
a logical system; and it is gratuitous to ask for a determination
of their meaning independently of this system. It follows,
of course, that, if in Hilbert's geometry the signification of
points, lines, the relations of "between-ness," "outside," etc.,
cannot be formulated except in relation to a selected axiom-
group, a variety of other elements and relations, if they satisfy
the formal conditions of the same axioms, must be considered
as equivalent to it. Against the very possibility of structural
isomorphisms, of different (though logically justifiable) inter-
pretations of the same basic calculus, the objection could perhaps
be raised that they merely prove the impossibility of arriving
at completely determined elements by means of implicit def-
initions. This apparent limitation, however, also marks the
very strength of mathematical, deductive thought, as was stated
by Cassirer distinctly in his Substance and Function:
Two different types of assertions, of which the one deals with straight
lines and planes, the other with cycles and spheres . . . are regarded as
equivalent to each other in so far as they provide for the same con-
ceptual dependencies. . . . The points with which Euclidean geometry
deals can be changed into spheres and circles, into inverse point-pairs
of a hyperbolic or elliptical group of spheres . . . without any change
being produced in the deductive relations of the individual propositions
. . . evolved for these points. . . . Mathematics recognizes (in these
points) no other 'being' than that belonging to them by participation in
this form. For it is only this 'being' that enters into proof and into the
processes of inference and is thus accessible to the full certainty that
mathematics gives to its subject-matter. 56
The relevance of these considerations for the problem at
hand may perhaps be put thus: Marc-Wogau's contention that,
if the terms of a relation are mutually determined, they there-
w Theoria, 1 69.
M Substance ana Function (Swabey tr.), 93.
io6 CARL H. HAMBURG
by must also be identical, is refutable, if we maintain the justi-
fiability of implicit definitions, respectively of the different
mathematical (logical) calculi which they make possible. And
vice versa: Marc-Wogau's charge, if taken seriously, would
not only refute the "logic" of the symbol-concept (with its
two distinct, yet correlative moments, its "sensuous" represen-
tation of the "non-sensuous"), but it would also have to refute
the "logic" of all those disciplines that could not constitute their
respective syntax-forms except by employment of implicit defi-
nitions. In consequence, Cassirer is convinced that, if the scien-
tist can proceed effectively with elements the meaning of which
is indefinable outside the axiom-system within which they occur,
the philosopher neither may (nor need) hope for more secure
foundations regarding the symbol-concept. Marc-Wogau's
charge of a contradiction inherent in this concept is thus
countered by Cassirer's reference to scientific syntax whose
elements are not considered identical merely because their
definition implies mutual determination.
(2) The empirical issue.
Regardless, however, whether correlativity of the relational
terms implies their "identity" or not, is there any other than
just formal evidence for the "fact" that, notwithstanding such
correlativity, a distinction between the symbol-moments is not
only logically permissible but also actually achievable? Before
examining the empirical evidence adduced in answer to this
question, it will be worth while to consider the issue here raised
in its full generality.
The symbol-concept, we suggested above, was to result from
Kant's epistemology, in so far as it was to cover all the "syn-
thesizing acts" which variously condition the many expressive,
perceptual, and conceptual forms in which we have the respec-
tive worlds of myth, art, common sense, and science. Instead
of departing from a taken-for-granted opposition between a
statically conceived "self" and a just as statically conceived
"world," the philosophy of symbolic forms was proposed
to examine the presuppositions upon which that opposition depends and
to state the conditions that are to be satisfied if it is to come about. It
finds that these conditions are not uniform, that there are rather different
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 107
dimensions of apprehending, comprehending and knowing the phenom-
ena and that, relative to this difference, the relationship between 'self
and 'world' is capable of characteristically different interpretations. . . .
True, all these forms aim at objectification on the level of perception
(zielen auj gegenstandliche Anschauung hin)^ but the perceived objects
change with the type and direction of such objectification. The phi-
losophy of symbolic forms, accordingly, does not intend to establish a
special dogmatic theory regarding the essence and properties of these
'objects,' but it aims, instead, to comprehend these types of objectifica-
tion which characterize art as well as religion and science. 87
It follows that, if no objectivity is held to be encounterable
except within the symbolic forms of myth and religion, of art,
common sense, and science, there also can be no chance to break
out of the "charmed circle" of these forms. If it is only under
the pervasive presupposition of these forms that we can appre-
hend, comprehend and know all the objects, however struc-
tured, how then will it be possible even to conceive of a polar
concept which, such as the "sensuous manifold," is claimed to
be distinguishable from the formal moment of the symbol-
relation? What answer, in other words, can be given to Marc-
Wogau's charge that, to be consistent, Cassirer cannot hope even
to make a "distinctio rationis** between the perceptual "matter"
and the significant "form" of the symbol-concept? As mentioned
earlier, it is typical of Cassirer's procedure that the resolution
of this problem is not left to logical or specifically "philo-
sophical" considerations as have conventionally been devoted
to the "form-matter" issue. The latter is to be evaluated, in-
stead, in the light of empirical evidence. Let us be clear once
more for just exactly what this empirical reference is to provide
evidence. What is under discussion concerns the question
whether the "material" moment of the symbol-concept (to
which we have variously referred as the "sensuous manifold,"
the "sensory- or perceptual data") although indeterminable
outside any given context ("perspective," "sight," "principle"
or "form of a series") can nevertheless be distinguished, i.e.,
conceived as different in principle from the sense-perspectives
within which it becomes manifest.
For evidence of the fact that this problem has been realized
87 Theoria (1938), 151.
io8 CARL H. HAMBURG
by scientists, Cassirer quotes these remarks from Karl Buehler:
No theory of perception should forget that already the most simple
qualities, such as 'red' and 'warm' usually do not function for them-
selves but as signs for something else, i.e., as signs of properties of
perceived things and events. The matter looks different only in the
comparatively problematic borderline-case where one seeks to determine
the 'Ansich* of these qualities in fercepion
But it is, of course, exactly this "borderline-case," i.e., whether
conditions for the isolation of the "Ansich" of perceptual data
can be instituted or not (and how such isolation is to be inter-
preted), that is at issue. The question, in other words, is whether
perceptual data can be stripped of their various representative
functions, and the relevance of having recourse to empirical
investigations would concern the technical possibility of operat-
ing such a reductive stripping of these data. For evidence of the
empirical feasibility of that reduction, Cassirer mentions the
German physiologists Helmholtz, Hering and Katz. Katz,
e.g., 59 had initiated a procedure involving, a.o., the observation
of colors through a punctured screen (ILochschirm) . "It turned
out that hereby (the colors) change their phenomenal character
and that there takes place a reduction of the color-impression
to ... the dimension of plane- (Flaechen-) colors." 60 Hering
performs similar reductions by means of a vision-tube (eine
irgendwie fixierte Roehre)^ whereas Helmholtz, more ingeni-
ously, gets along without any instruments and achieves com-
parable effects by "looking from upside down, from under one's
legs or under one's arms." Thus, Hering:
Place yourself near the window, holding in your hands a piece of
white and a piece of grey paper closely together. Now, turn the grey
paper towards the window, the white one away from it, so that the
retinal image of the grey paper will be more strongly illuminated than
the white one 5 but even though one will notice the change in light-
intensity, the now "lighter" but really grey paper will still appear as
grey, while the now "darker" but really white paper will be seen as
white. If now both papers are looked at through a tube, one will soon
M Die Krise der Psychologic (1927), 97.
59 In his Der Aufbau der Farbwelt, (ind edition 1930).
90 Grundziige elner Lehre <vom Lichtsinn. Paragraph 4.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 109
see both papers (if held so that one will not shade the other) on one
and the same level, and now the grey paper will be seen as the lighter
one, the white one as the darker one, corresponding to the difference in
the two light-intensities. 60
And Helmholtz:
We know that green plains appear at a certain distance in somewhat
different color-tones; we get used to abstract from this change and we
learn to identify the different 'green' of distant lawns and trees with
the corresponding 'green' of these objects, seen at close range. . . . But
as soon as we put ourselves into unusual circumstances, when we look,
e.g., from under our legs or arms, the landscape appears to us as a flat
picture. . . . Colors thereby lose their connection to close or distant
objects and now face us purely in their qualitative differences. 61
Similar reductions with respect to other than color-phenomena
are also referred to by Cassirer in this connection. 182
Now it seems that, if examples of the above-mentioned type
are taken as evidence for the fact that the severing of sensory
data from representative contexts is not only possible but actu-
ally (technically) achievable, Cassirer would both be proving
too much (with respect to what can be maintained within his
own strictures) and not enough (with respect to what he pre-
sumes to prove). For one, to suggest that Helmholtz's, Her-
ing's, and Katz's investigations succeeded in "de facto" isolating
the "pure color-phenomena" from their representative office,
would be to maintain more than Cassirer could allow for, after
taking pains to point out that the sensuous moment can never
actually be encountered independently of the sense (context-)
moment. To maintain such "isolation" would certainly not be
compatible with his contention that "there is nothing in con-
sciousness without thereby also positing . . . something other and
a series of such 'others.* For each singular content of conscious-
ness obtains its very determination from consciousness as a whole
which, in some form, is always simultaneously represented and
co-posited by it." 83 Nor could, or need, the alluded empirical
61 Hcmdbuch der Physiologischen Oftik, (1896), 607.
62 For haftical phenomena: Katz, Der Aufbau der Tastwelt (1925), 255. For
odor phenomena: Henning, Der Geruch (1924.), 275, 278.
m PSF, Vol. I, 32.
no CARL H. HAMBURG
illustration prove that this is not the case. What they may be
taken to support is not the view that color- values can be stripped
of their representative function, but only that by an appropri-
ate shift from a normal perception perspective to a controlled
two-dimensional perspective different interpretations hold
with respect to color-phenomena. The latter have, in effect, not
"really" been stripped of their representative office, but they
now "represent" plane instead of surface colors.
That the above is a preferable way of stating the matter is
suggested by an earlier pronouncement:
(After) the complete reduction of the color-impressions, they do not
represent ... a particular thing . . . (but) appear as members of a
series of light-experiences (Ltchterlebnisse) . But even these 'Lichter-
lebnisse* betray a certain structure in so far as they are sharply con-
trasted with each other, and in that they are organized in that contrast.
Not only do they have different degrees of coherence so that one color
appears separated from the other by a larger or smaller distance (where-
from issues a determinate principle of their serialization), but there
are assumed in this series certain privileged points around which the
various elements can be organized. Even when reduced to a mere
light-impression, the individual color-nuance is not just 'present' as
such but it also is representative. The individual 'red,' given here and
now, is given as V red, as a member of a species which it represents. . . .
Without this (co-ordination to a series), the impression would not even
be determinable as 'this one, 1 as TO$S te in the Aristotelian sense. 64
We must conclude, therefore, that it becomes impossible on
Cassirer's own view to conceive of the sensory moment of the
symbol-concept as isolable from any serial context. Thus,
whereas, under specifically controlled conditions, color-, sound-,
and other sensory data may cease to function representatively
for esthetic qualities, thing-surfaces and shapes, or for con-
ventional language-signs, their reduction will still not go be-
yond the physical and physiological contexts within which they
are identifiable as of a determinate wave-length, intensity, pitch,
etc. Marc-Wogau's charge that the "material" moment of the
symbol-concept is not distinguishable from its sense-moment
would, accordingly, hold if and only if the symbol-concept
, Vol. Ill, 157.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY in
allowed of application in one and not more than one sense-
context. To be sure, within any one perspective, the "whatness"
of a phenomenon is never determinable in separation from its
"how-ness," from the respective "sight" in which it is seen. With
a variety of symbolic contexts, however, there is also given the
possibility of their contrast and of distinguishing them as dif-
ferently oriented "modes of sight," of which it can be said that
they are "of" sensory data in the sense that a reduction to the
physico-descriptive dimension can be performed for all of
them. When Cassirer insists, therefore, that "there is always a
world of optical, acoustical and haptical phenomena in which
and by means of which all 'sense/ all apprehending, compre-
hending, intuiting and conceiving alone is manifest," 65 then the
conceivability of these sensory phenomena, as distinct from the
"sense" they manifest, must be interpreted to mean that a phys-
ical context (acoustics, optics, etc.) can be co-ordinated to all
other contexts in which the senses represent different types of
(expressive, intuitional, theoretical) sense.
The "material" moment of the symbol-concept, we could
say, as reference of and relevance for the sense-endowing
"formal" moment, may not be separately encountered or isol-
able within one context, but it is nevertheless distinguishable
as one context. To speak of it as "material," would seem to be
justified, if one considers the term to stand in the Aristotelian
sense for what is taken as that of which manifold determina-
tions are possible. What the term also suggests is that we are
dealing here with what as matter in space and time, is ac-
cessible to physical determination. In this sense, the material
moment refers not just to one among other contexts, but to the
most reliably controlled and pervasive one to which all other
contexts may indeed be "reduced."
In support of our belief that this interpretation of the "in-
dependent variability" of the two symbol-moments is adequate
with respect to what Cassirer aims to maintain, let us turn, in
conclusion, to an illustration adduced by him on various oc-
casions: 186 Cassirer bids us to think of a black line-drawing, a
"Theoria (1939)) *S3-
"E.g in: Zeitschrift fur Aesthetik, 1927, (Vol. XXI), 195. PSF, Vol. Ill,
331. Theoria (1938), 154.
ii2 CARL H. HAMBURG
"Linienzug" distinguished as a simple "perception experience."
Yet, while I still follow the various lines of the drawing in their visual
relations, their light and dark, their contrast from the background,
their up-and-down movements, the lines become, so to speak, alive.
The spatial form (das GebUde) becomes an aesthetic form: I grasp in
it the character of a certain ornament ... I can remain absorbed in the
pure contemplation of this ornament, but I can also apprehend in and
through it something else: it represents to me an expressive segment of
an artistic language, in which I recognize the language of a certain
time, the style of an historical period. Again the 'mode of sight' may
change, in so far as, what was manifest as an ornament, is now dis-
closed to me as a vehicle of a mythico-religious significance, as a magical
. . . sign. By a further shift in perspective, the lines function as a
sensuous vehicle for a purely conceptual structure-context. . . . To the
mathematician, they become the intuitive representation of a specific
functional connection. . . . Where, in the aesthetic sight, one may see
them perhaps as Hogarth beauty-lines, they picture to the mathematician
a certain trigonometric junction, viz., the picture of a sin-curve,
whereas the mathematical physicist may perhaps see in this curve the
law of some natural process, such as, e.g., the law for a periodic oscilla-
tion.
All depends here upon what is taken to remain "identical" in
all these modes of sight. When we say that it is the "Linien-
zug" which figures as the material moment in all contexts, in
what sense can we say that it is the "same" one, since we know
that it is seen as so many different things from context to con-
text? Cassirer's rather metaphorical pronouncements in this
connection can be clarified in the light of our interpretation. In
the passage quoted above, he speaks of the simple (schlichte)
"perception experience" in which the line-drawing is phenomen-
ally given before it "comes to life," i.e., enters into the various
perspectives mentioned. But clearly, if experienceable at all,
this "simple perception experience" must itself be taken as a
mode of sight and not as a moment prior and common to all
other sights. This formulation is particularly unhappy in the
light of other passages where Cassirer generalizes upon the il-
lustration given above by remarking that
the material moment is no psychological datum , but rather a liminal
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 113
notion (Grenzbe griff). . . . What we call the 'matter' of perception
is not a certain sum-total of impressions, a concrete substratum at the
basis of artistic, mythical or theoretical representation. It is rather a
line towards which the various formal modes converge. (Erne Linie
. . . in der sich die verschiedenen Weisen der Formung schneiden.)* 7
This space-metaphorical version of the issue would be amen-
able to the interpretation suggested in so far as the "matter of
perception" qua "convergence of the various formal modes"
could well be taken as the "reductibility" of all contexts to the
physico-physiological one from which Cassirer's actual evidence
is concededly derived. (Helmholtz, Hering, Katz, Buehler,
etc.)
SYMBOL-CONCEPT AND PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS
We conclude from the preceding discussion that a consistent
meaning may be assigned to Cassirer's theory of the symbol-
concept. The extreme generality of this concept is manifest when
expressed as a propositional function. We could say that the
property (of a "sensuous" representing "sense") limits in no
way whatsoever the scope of the particulars which may enter the
argument as true values. A symbolic relation, in other words,
must hold for all facts, because, as indicated above, no facts are
held to be statable without reference to some context; and no
context can fall outside the symbol formula, because, as a con-
text (Sinnzusammenhang), it must establish some exemplifica-
tion of a representative relationship. Now, this "representation
of sense through the senses" can take three distinct modal forms:
1 i ) If the referent of the senses is the affective-emotive system
of man, the senses are said to make "expressive sense."
(2) If the referent of the senses is the volitional-teleological
system of man, the senses make "common"-(thing-perceptual)
sense.
(3 ) If the referent of the senses is a system of theoretical order-
signs, the senses make conceptual, i.e., scientific sense.
It is to each of these "modi" of the symbolic relation that
there correspond the various cultural media. Thus:
67 Theoria (1938), 155-156. ED. NOTE: Cf. infra 330 f.
ii4 CARL H. HAMBURG
( i ) The expression-modus is taken to be exemplified in the
domains of myth, art, and (the substrata of) language, in all of
which media we deal with what Cassirer terms "Ausdrucks-
Charaktere" and what are variously referred to by other
contemporary philosophers, in related connotations, as "terti-
ary qualities," "essences," "prehensions," "significant forms,"
etc.
(2) The common sense or empirical-intuitional- (empirische
Anschaulichkeit)-modus is taken to be exemplified in the "nat-
ural world-view" which is both constituted and reflected,
Cassirer holds, by the "world of language."
(3) The conceptual (theoretical) modus is taken to be exem-
plified by the order-systems in which we have the "world of
science."
The philosophy of symbolic forms is, accordingly, a philos-
ophy of the cultural forms from which alone we can read the
various modalities within which symbolic functioning occurs and
of which the symbol-concept furnishes the most general formu-
lation.
From these cultural exemplifications of the "modi" of the
symbol-concept we must distinguish the "qualities" of the
most pervasive symbol-relations which, such as space, time,
cause, number, etc., are "constitutive" (in the Kantian sense) of
any and all objectivity. "The form of the simultaneous consti-
tutes a quality distinct from the form of succession." 68 But since
each "quality" is never manifest but in one of the three specified
modal forms,
we may conceive certain spatial forms (e.g. certain lines) as an artistic
ornament in one case, as a geometrical draft in another ... so that, in
consequence, the quality of a relation can never adequately be given
except in reference to the total system from which it is abstracted. If,
e.g., we designate the temporal, spatial, casual, etc., relations as Ri, R2,
Rs . . ., there belongs to each of these a special 'index of modality'
|*i, 1*2, [*s . . . which indicates the context within which they are to
be taken. 69
It follows that Cassirer could not consider as adequate any
, Vol. I, 29.
* PSF, Vol. 1, 3 1.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 115
philosophical analysis of space, time, cause, number, etc., unless,
besides mathematical and physical spaces, it also attempted to
account for the expressive and intuitional spaces of common
sense, art, myth, and religion.
In the light of the above, it will now be clear in which sense
Cassirer's theory of symbolic forms could be presented both as
a "philosophy of culture" and a "metaphysics of experience."
There can be little doubt that Cassirer himself preferred to
think of his work as providing "Prolegomena" for a philosophy
of culture. In this form, the Philosophie der symbolischen For-
men is actually developed, starting, as it does, from a philos-
ophy of language (Volume I, 1923) and moving on to a
philosophy of myth (Volume II, 1925) and to a philosophy of
(perceptual and conceptual) knowledge (Volume III, 1929).
All that would seem to be required, however, in order to
formulate Cassirer's various analyses of language, myth, and
the sciences as a "metaphysics of experience," would be to bring
together the many penetrating examinations of "expressive
space" (in the volumes on Language and Myth), of the "em-
pirical space" of common sense (in the volumes on Language
and Phenomenology of Knowledge), of mathematical and
physical spaces (in the volumes on Phenomenology of Knowl-
edge and Substance and Function), and to arrange them within
a single scheme of exposition, doing the same for the other
"categories." The result would be at least as universal a treat-
ment of the pervasive (symbolic) traits of "Being" as is ex-
pected of a metaphysical treatise.
To develop Cassirer's philosophy of symbolic forms as a
"metaphysics of experience" may appear bold, if not outright
paradoxical, in view of both Cassirer's frequent polemics against
"metaphysical speculations" in his early writings and in con-
sideration of the pronounced anti-metaphysical tenor of the
entire neo-Kantian movement of which Cassirer was one of
the most brilliant exponents. A closer examination of some of the
relevant passages, however, will back our contention that the
issue is essentially a terminological one. It concerns not so much
10 In accordance with the then ongoing Hegel-Renaissance, Cassirer preferred
the title : "Phaenomenologie der Erkenntnis."
n6 CARL H. HAMBURG
the possibility (or legitimacy) of metaphysics as a significant
philosophical enterprise as rather the questionability of what
the term "metaphysics" has connoted so far. Take, e.g., this
passage from Substance and Function:
When empirical science examines its own procedure, it has to recog-
nize that there is in the (metaphysical) struggles a false and technical
separation of ways of knowing that are both alike indispensable to its very
existence. The motive peculiar to all metaphysics of knowledge is here
revealed. What appears and acts in the process of knowledge as an
inseparable unity of conditions is hypostatized on the metaphysical view
into a conflict of things. 71
Now compare this passage with another one, written almost
thirty years later:
The history of metaphysics is by no means a history of meaningless
concepts or empty words ... it establishes a new basis of vision and from
it gains a new perspective for knowing the real. 72
What appears on the surface as a complete shift from a rejection
to an acceptance of metaphysical thinking must be recognized,
however, as a mere shift in emphasis with respect to an essen-
tially identical point of view. To be sure, Cassirer's statements
in Substance and Function are not as positive with regard to
metaphysics as the point he makes in the study on Hagerstrom y
where he asserts that "the genuine, the truly metaphysical
thoughts have never been empty thoughts, have never been
thoughts without concepts" (ibid.). Yet, in this same context
he goes on to warn us exactly as he did in his earlier work
that
the difficulties, dangers and antinomies of metaphysics arise from the
fact that its 'intuitions' themselves are not expressed in terms of their
true methodological character. None (of the great metaphysical in-
sights) is considered as giving insight into only a portion, but all are
claimed to generally span the whole of reality. . . . The subsequent
contest, resulting from such (partial) claims becomes at once a dialectical
conflict. (Ibid.)
M Substance and Function (Swabey tr.), 237.
" Axel Hagerstromi Eine Studie zur Scfawedischen Philosofhie der Gegewwart,
Ch.I.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 117
Cassirer's position is thus a consistent one. He does not side
with the positivistic contention that metaphysics is not only
"false," but also "meaningless." Instead, he distinguishes the
genuine character of the problems with which the great meta-
physicians have dealt, from the still imperfect modes in which
their findings have been presented. The metaphysical objective
is taken to be legitimate, whereas the metaphysical results can-
not be accepted without qualification, simply because meta-
physicians have offered "partial truths" as "universal" ones and
because, in focussing upon one aspect of symbolization (viz.
the mathematical, religious, aesthetic, or moral one), they have
lost sight of the equal validity of such other aspects as also must
be accounted for as legitimate paths to what in any perspective
may be referred to as the "real."
Now, since this denial of a privileged status for any one form
of representation is exactly what Cassirer has claimed for his
philosophy of symbolic forms, there does not seem to be any
reason why within his own pronouncements his work may
not indeed be considered as a kind of metaphysics, oriented
around the central notion of the symbol-concept, which charac-
terizes all aspects (contexts; Sinnzusammenhange) of the
"real," pervading as a common theme, the polyphony of all
cultural forms in which reality is perceived, understood, and
known. Now, if emphasis is put upon the mjost universal rela-
tional forms (space, time, cause, number, etc.) which reappear
in characteristic modifications in all of these forms, we would
be offered a metaphysics of (cultural) experience. If, on the
other hand, our exposition proceeds by way of separate analyses
of language, myth, religion, the mathematical and physical
sciences, the character of Cassirer's work would be more obvi-
ously one of a philosophy of culture. Regardless, however,
which form of presentation is chosen, each will center around
the idea of the symbol-concept.
Cassirer himself, when offered an opportunity to present
(in abbreviated form) his thoughts to an English-speaking
audience, subtitled his Essay on Man "An Introduction to a
Philosophy of Human Culture" Here, the emphasis is on the
cultural realities, the languages and rituals, the art-masterpieces
n8 CARL H. HAMBURG
and scientific procedures. To comprehend them philosophically
requires to realize them as so many symbolic manifestations
of different types of synthesizing activities.
The content of the culture-concept cannot be separated from the basic
forms and directions of significant (g^istigen) production; their 'being*
is understandable only as a 'doing.* It is only because there is a specific
direction of our aesthetic imagination and intuition that we have a
realm of aesthetic objects and the same goes for all our other energies
by virtue of which there is built up for us the structure of a specific
domain of objectivity. 73
An analysis of culture could, correspondingly, proceed along
both "material" and "formal" lines. It could either undertake a
descriptive classification of the products of the various cultural
activities, or it could seek "behind" this great diversity of mani-
festations the characteristic types of intuiting, imagining, and
conceiving, i.e., the "doings," in terms of which the "works"
become intelligible. It is only in focussing on the "doings" that,
according to Cassirer, we may hope to find a common de-
nominator. "We seek not a unity of effects, but a unity of
action; not a unity of products, but a unity of the creative
process." 74 But this "unity of the creative process" as is ob-
vious by now can be nothing else than the unity and univer-
sality of the symbolic function, expressed in the symbol-
concept.
The "culture-concept" must, accordingly, eclipse the "nature-
concept" which, in Substance and Function, still stands for the
regulative idea of "lawfulness" 'per se. It does so by reason of
the circumstance that, whatever the "nature-concept" connotes
at various historical periods, it is intelligible only as a function
of what the cultural media of art, religion, and science take it
to mean. Whereas "culture" creates, in an uninterrupted flow,
ever new linguistic, artistic, religious, and scientific symbols,
both "philosophy and science must break up these symbolic
languages into their elements. . . . (We must learn) to inter-
pret symbols in order to decipher the meaning-content they
, Vol. 1, 1 1.
74 Essay on Man, 70.
CONCEPTION OF PHILOSOPHY 119
enclose, to make visible again the life from which they orig-
inally came forth." 75
Measured against this considerable task, what we have in
the three volumes of the Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen
can hardly be expected to provide a full answer. Doubtless, a
more detailed examination of the various cultural phenomena
than offered so far would be required to make good the implied
promise. Cassirer himself was aware of the tentative char-
acter of his attempts in what he thought was the right direc-
tion.
The 'Philosophy of Symbolic Forms' cannot and does not try to be a
philosophical system in the traditional sense of this word. All it attempted
to furnish were the 'Prolegomena' to a future philosophy of culture.
. . . Only from a continued collaboration between philosophy and the
special disciplines of the 'Humanities' (Geisteswissenschafteri) may one
hope for a solution of this task. 76
CARL H. HAMBURG
TULANE UNIVERSITY
78 Logik der Kulturwissenschaften, 94.$ .
2
William Curtis Swabey
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS
E
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS
1 RNST CASSIRER is known to students of epistemology
1 and metaphysics as a learned, lucid, and skillful repre-
sentative of the neo-Kantian or "critical idealistic" point of
viewj no one can deny the competence with which he reviews
"the problem of knowledge in the science and philosophy of the
modern age," expounding, quoting, and criticizing innumer-
able authors, himself always firmly anchored in the critical
idealism of the Marburg School. In what follows I undertake,
with all becoming diffidence, to make explicit certain difficulties
which I find, not so much in Cassirer's writings as such, but in
the point of view of idealism itself. The learned material
which Cassirer presents, the information concerning mathe-
matics and physics from Galileo and Cusanus down to Einstein
and the quantum theory, is after all susceptible of more than one
interpretation 5 just as scripture supports various systems of
theology, so science does not oblige a philosopher to embrace
either idealism or realism. Cassirer's assemblage of historical
material, which he so eloquently and persuasively interprets
in the light of Kantianism, could be interpreted in the light of
realism, were there a sufficiently learned and skillful realistic
philosopher who was willing to undertake the task. Naturally,
in such a wide-spread application of the historico-critical
method, Cassirer has had to leave behind most of the scholastic
architectonic, which Kant offered to the world as never to be
changed 5 the modern disciple merely retains a "point of view,"
which is, as a matter of fact, extremely difficult to reduce to a
few definite assertions. The Kantian "thing-in-itself" has dis-
appeared and with it that vestige of realism, which was always
123
124 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
in the back of Kant's mind: the a priori has become fluid and
indefinite. The old opposition to metaphysics, on the one
hand, and to empiricism, on the other, remains. Emphasis is
placed on relations, especially upon those involved in serial
order.
The comments which follow will be made in the name of
metaphysics. By metaphysics I understand a theory of being
in general, a science which would deal with the fundamental
types of being and reality. It would take its stand on the in-
escapable ontological claims of all our thought and speech.
I do not, however, understand by metaphysics a discipline
which would deal primarily with those problems which Kant
dealt with under the caption Transcendental Dialectic; it may
be true that a degree of agnosticism is indeed the proper attitude
with regard to the dogmas of the metaphysics of religion;
metaphysics, as I understand it, is not to be understood as
primarily the science of the meta-empirical (and consequently
the un verifiable), but rather as that science which clarifies the
fundamental ontological claims of our thought. It is my opinion
that metaphysics, in this sense, is led to a standpoint of dualistic
realism, a standpoint which is perhaps not final, but which is
at any rate the only natural way of thinking. The dualism of
Descartes and Locke, although encumbered with many dubious
assertions in each case, still seems to me the philosophy which
is most clearly suggested by our common ways of talking; it is
perhaps in the end the only intelligible system, or, if it too
conceals some insoluble problems, it is the least unintelligible
system. By dualistic realism I mean a system which posits a
world of bodies and minds in continual interaction. Bodies are
self-existent entities with spatial attributes; minds are non-
spatial beings which continually interact with bodies and fur-
thermore know them both by perception and in other more
elaborate and indirect ways. Dualistic realism seems to the
idealist utterly unworthy of philosophy; for him, it is common-
place, if not downright vulgar; he would prefer to leave
behind mere things and delve into the mysteries of symbolism
and the super-sensuous regions. The realist, although sharing
to some extent the aspirations of the idealist, nevertheless puts
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 125
common sense clarity and intelligibility first, in his list of philo-
sophic values, and views mathematics as a dubious guide with
regard to problems of being and real existence. The idealist of
the type of Cassirer does not regard natural science as con-
cerned with a self-existent nature. On the contrary, nature is
the product of a synthesis of sensations and the history of
science is a process in which thought perpetually re-creates its
object.
The attitude of the criticist is one of reflection } he deals not
with things, but with thought about things j he lives in a world
of second intentions. Thus, such a philosopher as Cassirer does
not offer us a theory of bodies and minds, or of universals,
essences, relations and individuals in general j he speaks rather
as a scholar writing in a well-stocked library } nature is for
him something known only indirectly, primarily through the
books of scientists} it is an object postulated and described
by a series of authorities. Ultimately it exists only in their
minds j it undergoes, in the advance of science, modifications
making for greater extensiveness and unity. Cassirer, it is true,
has come to recognize points of view other than that of
science} namely, the standpoints of language and myth. Never-
theless the world exists, for the critical idealist, primarily as
an object of consciousness. In the end, I presume, it will be
found to exist only in the minds of historians} they, in turn,
will exist only in each other's minds. Being is everlastingly
dependent upon being known. My thesis is that the attitude
of critical idealism cannot consistently be maintained} thought
always claims to know an independent reality (or at least be-
ing)} and a consistent philosophy can only be reached by
following out the ontological claims of our unsophisticated
thinking.
The sub-title of Cassirer's Substanzbegriff und Funktions-
be griff is: Untersuchungen iiber die Grundfragen der Erkennt-
niskritik. The phrase Erkenntniskritik, or "critique of knowl-
edge," is worthy of our attention. How can knowledge be
criticized? If knowledge is knowledge it knows its objects as
they sre. The knowledge which can be destroyed by criticism
is not true knowledge} it is mere seeming knowledge and
126 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
nothing can replace such false knowledge save true knowledge.
Critique of knowledge must mean a criticism of certain sciences
as they actually exist, in which it is shown that they use con-
venient fictions and are thus not literally true. Still this is a
criticism of historically existing sciences and not of knowledge
as such. How can one criticize the sciences without in some way
knowing? One would, otherwise, have no way of being aware
of the shortcomings of the disciplines he was attempting to
criticize.
It is characteristic of the critical standpoint which Cassirer
consistently occupies that metaphysics is regarded as obsolete.
As Cassirer uses the word, metaphysics is merely a name for
certain bad habits of thought inherited from a crude and unen-
lightened past. In this Cassirer is in agreement with the prag-
matists and positivists. But philosophers are not to be left
without any employment at all; they may study "critique of
knowledge." They may pore over the treatises of mathema-
ticians and physicists and note the methods used and the funda-
mental trends. Yet it cannot be said that Cassirer, in the
chapters he has devoted to mathematics, physics, and chemistry,
writes merely as an historian of science. An account of these
sciences, taken merely as offered in the works of scientists,
would generally be in realistic terms; such an account, made
into philosophy, would be what is called materialism or mech-
anism. But Cassirer is an idealist; he thinks of the sciences as
dealing with "experience." What a strange object is experience!
It is neither a body nor a set of bodies, neither a mind nor a set
of minds. From the standpoint of dualism experience is the
result of the interaction of mind and body; our bodies are
affected by external things in various ways and our brains,
parts of our bodies, affect, according to certain laws of psycho-
physical correspondence, our minds; the result is what we
call experience. Experience is not as such the object of knowl-
edge; it is better to say that we know material things and
minds (including our own) by means of experience. To make
"experience" the all-inclusive object is itself a form of meta-
physics; it inescapably commits us to idealism. Or, if we sup-
pose that the intention is merely to deny the ontological validity
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 127
which science naturally claims for its assertions, still such
denial implies that philosophy possesses, at least in general
terms, a knowledge of what is, of being. The traditional name
of the branch of philosophy which deals with the fundamental
types of being is metaphysics. My contention is that every phi-
losophy, even that sort which makes a point of repudiating meta-
physics, involves some theory, however obscure, of the nature
of being as such. The criticist himself deals with metaphysical
problems, but in an indirect and inconsistent fashion.
If we start from the world as given to us in daily life and
common language, we easily distinguish between bodies and
minds. We find a world of bodies characterized by size, shape,
and state of motion or rest, having a continuous existence in
contrast to the coming and going of our perception, and dis-
playing regularity of behavior. But there are also minds which
have sensations, thoughts, and feelings ; by means of these
sensations and thoughts we somehow know bodies and are in
continual interaction with them; now it is true that, if we
regard knowledge as a matter of being affected from without,
we are likely to conclude that we know only our own sensa-
tions. But the causal theory of sensation itself presupposes
.knowledge of an external world. This world, by acting upon
our organisms, engenders an awareness of sense-qualities. The
idealist abandons the external material world on the basis of
facts drawn from that world itself; the realist feels that the
path of true philosophy consists in following the fundamental
ontological assumptions. As an historian, Cassirer postulates
a common sense world in which such persons as Leibniz, New-
ton and Kant really existed as psycho-physical beings. And yet,
like Kant, Cassirer is an idealist. Locke had laid the foundations
of a dualistic outlook; but, by thinking of the immediate object
or idea as "in the mind," he prepared the way for Berkeley,
Hume, and Kant. The world of bodies lost its absoluteness
and substantiality. Physical nature came to be replaced by
experience taken substantively. But what definite conception
can we form of experience? We know that neither Kant nor his
modern disciple would plead guilty to any simple form of
Berkeleyanism (such as that recently outlined by Professor
128 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
Stace), 1 which would reduce the world to spirits and their sense-
data, following one another according to inexplicable laws.
Cassirer's discussions of -logic, mathematics, physics, and
chemistry, emphasize the importance of judgment in discover-
ing relations. In general he is antagonistic to any purely em-
pirical account of mathematical or scientific conceptions. The
great object of science is relations, especially those giving rise
to serial orders. Relations, he holds, are not given to the senses,
but are evidence of the comparative and postulational activity
of the mind. But it is precisely here that difficulties appear.
Kant sharply distinguishes between what "comes in from
without" and the mind's own contribution. From the stand-
point of realism, however, it is obvious that the mind cannot
produce relations between things which are not already related }
thus, if two things are correctly judged to be similar or differ-
ent, it must be because they are already similar or different,
etc. Kant thought of the mind as "receiving" the "raw material
of sense" from "outside}" but this is all built upon a dubious
metaphor. Let me indicate how, as I suppose, the matter would
stand from the standpoint of psycho-physical dualism. We
postulate a brain as well as a mind} the latter is really merely a
series of thoughts. When the brain is stimulated in certain ways
sensa appear or occur} they occur, however, in relation to other
sensa which are either actually present or belong to the recent
or remote past} we experience sensa as simultaneous or succes-
sive, similar or different. When the brain is stimulated probably
a considerable area is affected} old "traces" and habits are re-
activated and the mind finds itself perceiving a real thing in
a world of material things. In all this there is no more occa-
sion to think of relations as creatures of pure consciousness or
of a transcendental mind than there is to think of the sensa
themselves in such a way. What we know is merely that per-
ception of things occurs; the categorial interpretation as well
as the data are the psychic accompaniments of brain-processes.
Thus the brain or the laws of psycho-physical correspondence
may take the place of the transcendental ego and its super-
natural spontaneity. But, at the same time, we must maintain
1 Stace, W. T., The 'Nature of the World (Princeton University Press, 1940).
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 129
also our essential doctrine that such perception, even though
occurring under such psycho-physical laws, is still perception,
a revelation of what is. 2 A psychological theory, whether it
comes under such transcendental psychology as Kant gives us
or such physiological psychology as has just been suggested,
nevertheless merely tells us under what conditions we come
to know a part of the real world. But the idealist thinks of
"synthetic activity" as creating a second world within the mind,
which in turn soon becomes the one real world.
In the first chapter of Substance and Function Cassirer re-
views the theories of ancient and modern logicians concerning
the concept; the general trend of his discussion may be de-
scribed by saying that he finds the traditional class-concept to
be in process of being supplanted by a new form of concept,
which is that of serial order. Modern mathematical science no
longer views nature as made up of things or substances; it is
primarily concerned with relations, and these relations give rise
to series of points, numbers, instants, etc. Hence Cassirer holds
that the form of the concept which is fruitful for modern
mathematical science is no longer the generic concept which
merely expresses what a number of pre-existent entities have
in common, but rather the "principle of serial order," which,
once assumed, "generates" the individuals which conform to it.
Against this view, I would suggest the following objections.
Cassirer is mistaken if he imagines that such "principles" can
ever take the place of class-concepts. For a serial order pre-
supposes a group of entities which are ordered, whether real or
unreal, such as points, numbers, colors, temperatures, etc. We
can only refer to these elements by means of concepts in the
traditional sense. Furthermore, a principle of serial order is
not a concept at all; it is a proposition. Thus, of a row of
soldiers, I may be able to say that each man is taller than the
one before him. This is a mere description of given individuals,
but it is expressed in a proposition. In mathematics I may
grandly postulate a series of unreal entities, such that each one
is related to the preceding one in a certain way; still here too
2 Cf. Sellars, R. W., The Philosophy of Physical Realism (New York, Mac-
inillan, 1932), 70.
130 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
the principle of serial order is not what is commonly called a
concept. Or, consider such relations as similarity, equality,
greater than, etc. How are relations in any sense rivals of
class-concepts? Relations are relations, concepts are concepts,
but of course there are concepts of relations and relations of
concepts. Here I shall venture a definition. Concepts are uni-
versals connected with words as their meanings} universals are
potentially recurrent features of either real or unreal entities.
They are capable of appearing more than once (cf. blue, square,
etc.}) while individuals are unique beings which occur once and
once only. Individual things may be unreal, e.g., points, in-
stants, geometrically perfect bodies, etc.} but all such things
have, with reference to concepts, what is called their essence,
which consists of those properties which entitle them to belong to
a given class. Thus an individual man may be considered merely
as a man and must have those properties which warrant us in so
considering him. These properties are said to constitute the
essence of man. The concept of man has these properties as its
connotation. When we take these points into account, it becomes
highly doubtful whether there is any justification for replacing
the class-concept by a "principle of serial order."
Everything to which we can refer has its concept, points,
instants, numbers, relations, as well as the types of plant and
animal. Thus, if we speak of circles or triangles or of numbers,
of variables, or of series, we do so by means of words, which
have the traditional type of class-concept as their meanings. It is
true that all members of a class are similar to each other in
certain respects; nevertheless similarity alone does not define a
class (since the members of all classes are similar to other mem-
bers of their respective classes) unless we tell wherein the
members are similar, and this can be done only by mentioning
the feature that all the members of the class have in common.
This common element may be either determinate or determi-
nable. Thus color is a determinable feature and can occur in
actuality only when rendered perfectly specific, namely, as
this nuance of this particular color. When the common element
is determinable it demands supplementation; nevertheless, we
cannot deny that all the things named by a generic term have
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 131
something in common} this is a universal and may belong to
the essence of those individuals. This doctrine, however, im-
plies nothing which would minimize the importance of rela-
tions. Still, it is true that the relations of a thing do not make
it what it is, that is, do not belong to its essence. Thus a lamp
or a shoe is what it is by virtue of its definitive properties,
without regard to when or where it is, by whom manufactured
or to what use it is put. It should be remarked, however, that
nothing has an essence save with reference to some defining
concept. Thus, if a lamp is no longer regarded as a lamp but
as a piece of metal it is said to have a different essence.
Furthermore, nothing can lose its essence without being annihi-
lated; if the lamp is thrown into a furnace and melted, it ceases
to exist as a lamp. The properties of water as water do not
change when water is frozen or vaporized or made to stand
upright in a glass tumbler; its nature includes the facts that
it will evaporate when heated, solidify when chilled, stand up-
right when enclosed in a glass, etc. Thus the essence of a sub-
stance is not affected by its relations to other things; if we con-
sider water solely as a liquid, then we know from experience
that it continues to exist as a liquid only as long as a certain
range of temperatures persists; if these temperatures pass be-
yond certain limits, liquid water is annihilated. Thus, whether
a thing exists or not depends on its relations, but its essence
is not so dependent. There is, therefore, a good meaning in
the old doctrine that relations are all extra-essential, the only
exceptions being found in those cases in which things are named
by the relations in which they stand; husband, captain, servant,
etc. The chief point which I wish to make is that the logic of
the concept and essence applies to all things, including points,
instants, numbers, propositions, and relations; it can by no
means be replaced by "functional relations" or "principles of
serial order." Thus, beings may stand in serial relations, but
they must have their essence prior to and apart from their
relations; this is because we are dealing, in our statements
about essence, merely with entities as such. Numbers, points,
instants and the rest must be entities before they can stand in
relations to each other.
132 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
Cassirer is in general an advocate of a "logical" theory of
number; but he rejects the emphasis upon the correspondence
of classes characteristic of Frege and Russell. His fundamental
aim is to vindicate the priority of serial order as a basis for
mathematical science. His theory is therefore the opposite of
that which defines number in terms of equivalent classes. Two
groups are said, according to Russell, "to belong to the same
number" when there is a relation of possible co-ordination be-
tween the members of the two groups. Cassirer's opinion that
the definition of number as a class of classes by no means
corresponds to the meanings of the names of numbers in daily
life seems to be sound. "The 'how many' of the elements, in
the ordinary sense, can be changed by no logical transformation
into a bare assertion concerning 'just as many'." 3 Cassirer him-
self advocates an ordinal theory of numbers according to which
"the individual number never means anything by itself alone"
and "a fixed value is only ascribed to it by its position in a total
system." 4 According to the "cardinal" theory, to which Cassirer
is opposed, "the members (of the number series) are deter-
mined as the common properties of certain classes before any-
thing whatever has been established as to their relation of
sequence. Yet in truth it is precisely in the element here at
first excluded that the peculiar numerical character is rooted." 5
This is Cassirer's statement of his view. The philosophy of
number is a matter concerning which a non-mathematician
may well be cautious. Perhaps I shall not be wrong, if I call
attention to a principle which is rather generally accepted,
namely, that we gain insight into the meaning of even the most
general propositions only by analysis of particular illustrative
cases. In application to the problem of number it is difficult
to see how mathematicians or anyone else can understand any-
thing whatever save with reference to relations which are
actually given in sensuous experience. I can well believe that
1 Cassirer, Ernst, Substance and Function, (Swabey tr., Open Court Publishing-
Company, Chicago, 1923), 48. Since most of my quotations from Cassirer's writ-
ings will be from this particular volume, I shall hereafter abbreviate it : SF.
4 1 bid.
*lbid.
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 133
in the case of ordinary calculation blind symbol-manipulation
takes the place of "intuitive" understanding, and there is no
reason why it should not; mathematics is, on the whole, a
technique for dealing with relations far too complex for us
to understand. Nevertheless, the basis of mathematics must be
in the relation of small numbers which can easily be grasped.
The relations of small numbers may be illustrated by sense-
data and those of the larger numbers understood by analogy
with the smaller ones. Taking its start from simple sensuous
experiences the mind conceives and postulates an infinite system
of numbers 5 number is given to sensuous experience as the
form-quality of a group of entities. Three-ness is a quality of
each and every group of three, etc. Now it is true that numbers
form a series, a series stretching to infinity. My point, with
regard to Cassirer's theory of number, is that the "principle"
or "form" of the series cannot be understood save by reference
to its individual members, which must be given before "the
principle of the series" can be understood. If we say that a given
number can only be understood in its relations to all other
numbers, it follows that no number can be understood; for the
series of numbers can never be given as a whole. If, therefore,
to understand "3" it were necessary to understand all the num-
bers, the task would be an impossible one. But knowing what
i, 2, and 3, etc., are, as patterns or form-qualities, with refer-
ence to small groups, we see that they are capable of being
arranged in a series such that each number is equal to the
preceding number plus one. But, if I did not know what num-
bers were and had no notions of addition, equality, etc., I could
form no idea of such a series or its principles. The elementary
number-equations seem to be related to a fact of experience,
namely, that the same group can always be taken in different
ways. Thus six apples can be taken by the mind as one group,
or, in various ways, as two or three groups: the fact that these
transformations are always possible is so easily verified that
it is natural to suppose that the laws of arithmetic are a priori.
They may, however, be regarded as well-established generali-
zations based on easy and oft-repeated mental experiments.
134 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
It is quite true that such numbers as zero, fractions, and
those which are labelled negative, irrational, and imaginary
are not "funded qualities" of given groups; they require a
more involved derivation. Fundamentally, however, the point
must be insisted upon that these are not numbers in the original
sense of the word; they are rather fictions or quasi-numbers,
which could never be understood did we not have definite con-
cepts of the small integers, y* represents a division which can-
not be carried out; the symbol is meaningful only because we
are ready to substitute for the abstract concept of pure unity
the concept of distance or area or material object. In the same
way, to understand -2 we go beyond the notion of number to
that of a series having direction. According to Dedekind, irra-
tional numbers are "cuts," or divisions in the number-series.
"The 'cuts' may be said to be numbers," says Cassirer, "since
they form among themselves a strictly ordered manifold in
which the relative position of the elements is determined accord-
ing to a conceptual rule." 6 But there is here a point which
calls for comment. Words may change their meanings, but
meanings themselves do not change. A new concept of number
is only a new meaning attached to an old word. The point I
would make is that, whereas irrational numbers may be in some
sense as good as other numbers, i.e., they may conform to
certain laws, still they are not numbers in the original sense
of the word. Unless we start with what Frege scornfully re-
ferred to as "pebbles and gingerbread nuts," i.e., with that con-
ception of number, of "how many," which the child applies to
his fingers and toes, we cannotjunderstand the new extended
sense of the word in which V 2 ma y be said to be a number.
The technical kinds of number are not numbers in the primary
sense of the word, and they can only be defined in terms of
experience in roundabout ways, as, for example, imaginary
completions of processes, which cannot in fact be completed.
A number is a quality of a finite group; an infinite number is,
on the face of it, something inconceivable, or even self-contra-
dictory. Cassirer would say that we grasp an infinite series
when we know the law by which it is generated. I would say,
9 SF, 61.
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 135
however, that we know that law only in terms of the relations
of small whole numbers; these relations seem to me to be
simply given in the same elementary way in which the sense-
qualities are given; there seems no point in speaking, as Kant
did, of a dual origination of sense-qualities "coming in from
the outside" and relations having the more noble characteristic
of having been generated in the mind. From the standpoint of
physiological psychology, both qualities and relations originate
within the mind on the occasion of the activation of the brain;
from the standpoint of realistic epistemology, relations hold
between material things, whether or not these relations are
known by any mind.
A question of prime importance for the understanding of
Cassirer's position is concerned with the meaning to be attached
to the phrase a priori. I presume that the meaning which most
philosophers would give to the term would be simply the
intuitively certain. Thus the multiplication table and the axioms
of Euclid are commonly regarded as at least legitimate examples
of what was formerly regarded as a priori. The a priori in this
sense cannot change; it is capable of becoming intuitively cer-
tain to all who understand the meaning of the propositions.
Man may be mistaken as to what is self-evident; but the rule
holds that "once self-evident, always self-evident." If a prin-
ciple is at a later time discovered not to be self-evident, this
implies that the earlier thinkers were mistaken in regarding the
principle as self-evident. Thus, if the "axioms" of geometry
are not, in the light of modern thought, self-evident, they were
not so in the days of Kant, either, although he falsely thought
that they were. The a priori then admits of no variation. Kant
claimed this sort of truth not only for the axioms of Euclidean
geometry but for his whole transcendental system as well. Mod-
ern mathematical science, however, no longer recognizes the
unique authority of Euclidean geometry; it recognizes other
systems which it offers impartially to physics; this science
chooses, for certain purposes, a non-Euclidean system; indeed,
no one has given a more lucid account of this whole develop-
ment than Cassirer himself in his essay, Einstein's Theory of
Relativity. How, then, can one still defend the a priori? The
136 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
answer is, only by changing the meaning of the term and
ascribing this new meaning to Kant as his "deeper meaning."
And if this is done it becomes a real question whether rational-
ism differs significantly from empiricism. Cassirer emphasizes
the "active," "synthetic," and "relating" functions of the mind
as opposed to the passive receptivity of sense-perception. The
mind exercises its intellectual functions and in this consists its
a priori character. Yet it may be questioned whether this doc-
trine has a clear meaning. The mind can only distinguish that
which is already different } it can rightly regard as similar only
that which is already similar, etc. If we assume, as dualistic
realism does, a world of independently existent things, these
things must have numerical, spatial, and causal relations. The
mind cannot create these relations. Or, if we retreat to a
Berkeleyan world of bodiless spirits, there will still be relations
of one sort or another between these spirits. Our minds are
active in shifting their attention from one object to another and,
furthermore, in speaking and in writing} using words, we
"create worlds," "weave relations," "split asunder," and "re-
combine what we have separated," etc. In the use of words,
therefore, we are no doubt creative} but it is difficult to see
how our "judgmental activity" can actually either affect or
create things or relations.
However, let us return to the subject of space. Cassirer, in
Substance and Functlon y quotes with approval the view of Well-
stein that Kant's intuitive theory of mathematics was a "resid-
uum of sensualism still attached to the Kantian idealism." 7
The new mathematics, Cassirer believes, brings out the logical
rather than the empirical character of pure mathematics. Now
this opinion seems to be widespread if not universal among
students of modern mathematics. We may sum up the matter
by saying that, in so far as mathematics is a logically necessary
system of deductions, it is certain but not true} in so far as it is
true, it is not certain a priori. It was only Kant's extraordinary
invention of an a priori sensibility which was compatible with the
supposed character of Euclidean geometry, namely, that it was
both a priori and true of real things. It is interesting to recall
1 SF, 1 06.
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 137
here the view of geometry which Hume propounds in his
Treatise of Human Nature. He tells us that in geometry "we
ought not to look for the utmost precision and exactness. None
of its proofs extend so far. It takes the dimensions and propor-
tions of figures justly; but roughly, and with some liberty." 8
For Hume the only possible criteria of existential truth were
sense-data, and sense-data are often compatible with several
geometrical propositions. Modern geometry may well be, as
Cassirer says, a purely logical system dealing with postulated
relations in an abstract manifold; this, however, is not the ele-
mentary geometry of the older thinkers; with regard to that
(elementary) system events seem to have shown that Hume,
who was no great admirer of mathematics, was more nearly
correct than Kant, who earnestly sought to eternalize the
mathematical science of his time by giving it a transcendental
foundation.
Metaphysics deals with problems of an entirely different
order. It deals with the nature of being and of real existence,
if the two are to be distinguished, with the difference between
mind and matter, universal and individual, etc., but without
taking anything from the special sciences. But for Cassirer
metaphysics is merely a name for certain unfortunate intel-
lectual tendencies, which disappear in the light of critical phi-
losophy. Let us see what he has to say in the chapter entitled
"The Problem of Reality" in Substance and Function. The
fundamental vice of metaphysics is, in general, that it sets up,
as an opposition of things (Widerstreit der Dinge) what in the
process of knowledge is an inseparable unity of conditions. Thus
persistence and change, unity and plurality, thought and being
are falsely opposed to each other in the metaphysical approach. 9
"If once things and the mind become conceptually separated
they fall into separate spatial spheres, into an inner and an outer
world, between which there is no intelligible causal connection."
(271) But this is a very cavalier way of speaking. It refers to
metaphysics in a broad condemnatory way without distinguish-
8 Hume, Treatise of Human Nature, Book I, Part 2, Section 4. (Selby-Bigge
ed., p. 45)-
^,237.
138 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
ing the actual doctrines held by metaphysicians. It is not clear
that metaphysicians must fall into the fallacies named. Mind
and body may be entirely distinct from each other in essence and
yet in constant interaction. If mind is essentially non-spatial, it
cannot be spatially separated from bodies, since only what is in
space can be spatially remote from anything else. Furthermore,
the essential distinction of mind and body does not imply that
mind cannot know body.
If we consult immediate experience, wHich is free from re-
flection, says Cassirer, we find that it is wholly without the
distinction between the objective and the subjective. (272)
For such experience there is only one level of being which con-
tains all content within itself. The intellectual experiment
which Cassirer proposes is a difficult one; just what are we to
subtract to reach "immediate experience?" Still, without chal-
lenging the proposition laid down, we may point out that most
of us are familiar with two distinctions, namely, that between
the objective and the subjective and that between the mental
and the physical. Thus, another person's mind is objective, in
the sense of really existent, although wholly mental in charac-
ter. The same is true of our own minds. On the other hand, an
hallucinatory dragon may be physical in nature and yet unreal,
which is, I suppose, what Cassirer means by subjective. Even
if we grant that the supposed "immediate experience" does not
contain the opposition between the subjective and the objective,
it might contain the opposition between the mental and the
physical. If we were conscious of any distinctions at all (and
otherwise how could we be conscious or how could there be
experience?) we might note the difference between sense-data
and the thought which plays over them and calls, as Cassirer
says, some of them subjective and others objective. In fact, if
our words referring to the mind have a bona fide meaning,
there must be an immediate experience by the mind of the mind
itself, an original form of self-knowledge, an awareness of
awareness. At a later stage, our primitive awareness of sense-
data becomes a perception of things and our awareness of the
activity of thought becomes an explicit knowledge of the mind
by itself.
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 139
But let us return to the contemplation of the one plane of
immediate experience} at this stage all seems objective, and
hence there is no occasion for the "false metaphysical problem"
as to how we pass from the subjective to the objective. But, says
Cassirer, at the first appearance of reflection a division sets in,
according to which, data are not simply accepted but are dis-
tinguished in their value. Unique and fleeting observations, he
says, are forced into the background while typical experiences
which recur under similar conditions are emphasized. Cassirer
is here attempting a hypothetical reconstruction of the process
by which our belief in an external world arises. The mind sorts
out its impressions and there emerges a consciousness of ob-
jective things.
Along with the loose associative connections of perceptions united only
under particular circumstances (as, for example, under definite physio-
logical conditions) there are found fixed connections, which are valid for
a whole field of objects and belong to this field independently of the
differences given in the particular place and time of observation. We find
connections which hold their ground through all further experimental
testing and through apparently contrary instances and remain steadfast
in the flux of experience while others dissolve and perish. It is the former
that we call "objective" in a pregnant sense, while we designate the latter
by the term "subjective." 10
Now none can doubt that in the pursuit of empirical knowl-
edge, it is important to separate trivial and accidental connec-
tions from those which are universal and are said to be "essen-
tial" and "necessary." But how is this connected with the
distinction between the subjective and the objective? It is a fact,
let us say, that on Friday the I3th I lost my purse, and it is also
a fact that water is essential to life. The first is no more sub-
jective than the second. If, however, I permitted myself to
generalize from the former occurrence, I would propound a
false superstitious law of bad luck. Such a generalization would
indeed be false and would be founded on inadequate observa-
tion. A law of this type might be called "subject! vej" but the
occurrences which cause some men to accept it as true are as
HO WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
objective as any other occurrences. It seems that Cassirer is seek-
ing to reduce the distinction between the subjective and the ob-
jective to that between particular events and universal laws.
But the former are as objective as the latter. He says:
We finally call objective, those elements of experience which persist
through all change in the here and now and on which rests the un-
changeable character of experience, while we ascribe to the sphere of
subjectivity all that belongs to this change itself and that only expresses
a determination of the particular unique here and now. 11
But this sentence is obscure, particularly with reference to the
phrase "elements of experience;" it might mean that colors,
sounds, tactile qualities, and the like are objective, for they are
recurrent elements in all experience; we gather from the con-
text, however, that this would be far from what he means. He
has in mind laws or connections, but laws or connections are
merely propositions supposed to be true descriptions of the way
in which events occur; and what occurs universally is no more
objective (really existent) than what occurs once and once only.
However, perhaps we can make clear what Cassirer means
if we refer to the classic instance of the wine which was sweet to
Socrates when well, but bitter to Socrates when ill. Should we
say that the wine is objectively sweet because it is normally
tasted as sweet by Socrates and others; while it is tasted as
bitter only by Socrates when he is ill? This would be a way of
permitting the feelings of the majority to function as the
criterion of objectivity; although this is an attractive and popu-
lar answer to the question, it seems scarcely well founded; un-
less, perchance, we choose to define objectivity with reference
to the majority. There is another way of dealing with this prob-
lem which commences by asking us to define our terms. Let
us say that those features of bodies are objective which belong
to them without reference to observers. Sweetness is merely an
effect produced by bodies acting on our psycho-physical organ-
isms and belongs to the wine no more than does the bitterness,
save in the sense that the wine has the power to produce a
certain sensation in the minds of most people. It is merely con-
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 141
venient to name the wine according to the more common re-
sponse. But this convenience does not constitute objectivity in
the sense of real existence, apart from all onlookers.
Cassirer himself goes on to mention the Democritean distinc-
tion between the primary and secondary qualities of bodies. For
him it is an illustration of the "transformation of objectivity
into subjectivity." "The seen color, the heard tone, remains
something *realj j only this reality does not subsist in isolation
and for itself, but results from the interaction of the physical
stimulus and the appropriate organ of sensation." 12 Similar con-
siderations apply to the illusions of the senses. The distinction
between the subjective and the objective is thus, for Cassirer,
not a fixed line of demarcation but a moving and relative
barrier, such that the same content of experience can be called
subjective and objective, according as it is conceived relative
to different logical frames of reference.
Sensuous perception, as opposed to the hallucination and the dream,
signifies the real type of the objective; while measured by the schema
of exact physics, sense perception can become a phenomenon that no
longer expresses an independent property of things but only a subjective
condition of the observer. 13
Such a view commits us to a boundless relativism in which no
definite distinction can be drawn between the mental and the
physical. The mental is identified with the subjective and un-
real. Erkenntniskritik thus seems to involve an attitude of
intellectual nihilism, in which both mind and nature disappear
in a bottomless abyss of relativity.
The standpoint of dualistic realism, on the other hand, even
if not capable of proof, is not self-refuting. At an early stage
men, and probably animals too, become conscious of the thing-
world of which they themselves are parts ; they find themselves
continually interacting with these things. When we consider the
way in which sensations originate it becomes probable that colors
and tones belong to external things only in the sense that they
are produced by them. The seen color may be considered either
"W,2 7 4.
"^,275.
142 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
as a predicate of external things or in its own right 5 when taken
in its own right, it becomes what some call a sense-datum and
others as essence. In any case, the seen color is not mental in
the sense of belonging to the inner essence of mind as con-
sciousness or knower; on the other hand, it does not belong to
nature as an interacting system of bodies. Taken merely as ob-
jects by themselves colors, sounds, odors, and the like belong to
the non-existent, to the realm of being, which is so much broader
than the realm of existence. Thus the change which took place
with regard to the secondary qualities need not be described as
one in which what was previously thought to be physical comes
to be thought of as mental 5 it may be described as a change in
which what was previously thought to be an intrinsic property
comes to be regarded as a mere relative predicate.
Cassirer's approach to the problem of knowledge is that of
a reflective historian of philosophy and science; he thus seems
to avoid any definite metaphysical position of his own; never-
theless, it seems fair to say that a definite ontological platform
is involved in so far as we may speak of Cassirer as an idealist.
This position is one of phenomenalism. The things which we
postulate in daily life are posited to explain, as Hume put it,
the constancy and coherence of our perceptions. The senses
alone do not show us a world of nature, but our minds have a
natural tendency to postulate as much uniformity as they can;
sense-perception gives us a fragmentary, incomplete order
which we make perfect by the assumption that things exist be-
fore and after our actual perceptions. Science carries the process
further. The "things" which it posits are "metaphorical expres-
sions of permanent connections of phenomena according to law
and thus expressions of the constancy and continuity of experi-
ence itself." 14 In comment upon this position, which Cassirer
maintains in agreement with the views of Hume and Kant, it
may be remarked that an account of how we come by a belief
need not involve the notion that that belief is itself false. To
explain, as John Stuart Mill did, the origin of our belief in an
external world does not imply that no external world exists.
In fact, we may say that such an explanation starts with an
assumption of the validity of that belief in so far as there is talk
14 SF, 276.
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 143
of "sensations" or "perceptions" which are intermittent, a
notion which is significant only in contrast to continuously
existent things. Does the mind "construct" things? Why should
we not say that, on the occasion of the occurrence of sensations,
the mind comes to know of things as continuously existent
entities which interact with each other and with the mind it-
self?
But let us seek to discover the proper formulation of
Cassirer's idealism. Metaphysical realism, he says, postulates an
absolute gap between the immanent and the transcendent, and
declares that there is no logical inference by which we can pass
from the former to the latter. The realist, he says, finds it
necessary to leap the gap by insisting on the transcendent refer-
ence of knowledge, Cassirer denies, however, that such con-
siderations invalidate his own form of critical idealism.
Critical idealism, [he writes,] is distinguished from the realism here
advocated, not by denying the intellectual postulate at the basis of these
deductions of the concept of objective being, but, conversely, by the fact
that it grasps this intellectual postulate more sharply and demands it for
every phase of knowledge, even the most primitive. Without logical
principles which go beyond the content of given impressions there is as
little a consciousness of the ego as there is a consciousness of the object.
. . . No content can be known and experienced as "subjective" without
being contrasted with another content which appears as objective. 15
The essential thought here is that the subjective and the ob-
jective are correlative and that consciousness is not immediately
given to itself as such. This doctrine is no doubt derived from
the position taken by Kant in his "Refutation of Idealism" in
the Critique of Pure Reason, namely, that knowledge of the
subject is secondary and is dependent upon knowledge of the
object "with regard to its determinations in time." But why
cannot the realist welcome considerations of this sort? There is
a directness of reference in the mind's knowledge of external
things as well as in its knowledge of itself j no doubt the two
forms of knowledge develop $ari passu and cannot exist apart
from each other. Still, if there is knowledge of things, those
things must exist apart from knowledge and prior to it. In a
15 W, 295.
144 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
word, being must antedate being known; we cannot suppose
that things known exist only in our knowledge of them; for,
"creative knowledge" is not knowledge at all in the human
sense of the word. The thought that being depends on being
known brings us to most surprising results. For then the knower
would also derive his being from being known either to himself
or to another. It is impossible, however, for a thing to depend
on itself, and not plausible to suppose that one knower derives
his being from being known by another and so on ad infinitum.
Surely in the end we must reach a type of being which is self-
existent.
We have just seen that Cassirer holds that there is no con-
sciousness of the ego nor of material things without "logical
principles" which "go beyond the content of given impressions."
However, this position seems open to question. A man may
think of whatever he likes, gods, devils, angels, or atoms. There
is, in such thinking, a certain directness; we contemplate our
object, whatever it may be, without, however, necessarily af-
firming its existence. A man may, therefore, consider his own
mind, which he does whenever he speaks of it. Where are the
"logical principles" said to be involved? No doubt it is true that
the self, however it may be defined, is not among given im-
pressions or sense-data. Still, I can mean myself just as I can
mean the table. All objects of thought are given as objects;
although we are not thereby entitled to regard them as real.
The real existence of the self is postulated to explain certain
facts just as that of the table is postulated to explain certain
others; no doubt this "explanation" does presuppose certain
logical principles. Nevertheless, has Cassirer shown that the
assertions of the "metaphysical realist," namely, that there are
minds and that these minds know things external to themselves,
are false?
"If we determine the object, not as an absolute substance
beyond all knowledge, but as the object shaped in progressing
experience, we find that there is no epistemological gap to be
laboriously spanned by some authoritative decree of thought,
by a 'trans-subjective command'." 16 Naturally the object is not
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 145
"beyond all knowledge," since by definition it is the object of
knowledge. How can an object be "shaped in progressing ex-
perience?" Do scientists re-make the world? Does Cassirer
mean to deny that the thing known is distinct from the knowing
mind and existentially independent of that mind? Cassirer him-
self goes on to say:
This object may be called transcendent from the standpoint of a psycho-
logical individual; from the standpoint of logic and its supreme principles,
nevertheless, it is to be characterized as purely "immanent." It remains
strictly within the sphere which those principles determine and limit,
especially the universal principles of mathematical and scientific knowl-
edge. This simple thought alone constitutes the kernel of "critical
idealism." 17
Here then we have a statement offered as the essence of critical
idealism and well worthy of our attention. Cassirer grants that
the object is transcendent from the standpoint of the psycho-
logical individual. Does he mean that the object is not trans-
cendent with reference to the "mind" taken in some other
sense? Apparently he does, for he goes on to say that the object
is immanent "from the standpoint of logic and its supreme
principles." However, we may well ask whether there is any-
thing to which logic does not apply. In asserting that the object
is immanent in this sense, have we not a meaningless statement,
since there is no transcendent realm with regard to which the
immanent is a limited sphere? In a word, in so far as Cassirer's
idealism merely asserts (if we may cite such laws as non-
contradiction and excluded middle as "supreme principles of
logic") that "what is" is self-consistent and determinate, we
can hardly deny that the doctrine is not in conflict with dualistic
realism. Such idealism would be merely a re-affirmation of logic
and mathematics and not a recognizable epistemological asser-
tion. If Cassirer's idealism contradicts realism at any point it
must be because he regards the principles of logic and mathe-
matics as inherent in the mind, just as Kant did. Cassirer goes
on to assert "the objective validity of certain axioms and norms
of scientific knowledge." "Die Wahrheit des Gegenstands dies
17 Cf. SF, 297.
146 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
allein ist die Meintmg hangt an der Wahrheit dieser Axiome
tmd besifat keinen anderen und fester en Grund." 16 But how can
an object be true? An object is real or unreal; only a proposition
is capable of truth. The fact that certain logical laws are uni-
versally presupposed in other propositions does not imply that
being is dependent upon being known and is therefore not
incompatible with dualistic realism. The assertion of the in-
volvement of logical principles in more particular judgments
implies a conflict with realism only if logical truths are supposed
to represent the necessary thoughts of a universal consciousness;
all things may then be said to be within this universal mind. But
this universal mind seems to be merely a postulated correlative
of universal truths. Cassirer says nothing about a universal
mind, and thus seems to leave the conception of idealism indefi-
nite. He does, however, conceive of the mind as perpetually en-
gaged in a constructive activity. We are left with a protean
"thought" which postulates, on the one hand, bodies, and on the
other, selves. The thesis which we seek to defend in this criticism
is that such "construction" is merely metaphorical. The mind
may range through the realm of being, the world of thinkables,
in an exploratory fashion, merely considering hypotheses; but,
in all this it creates nothing; it merely discovers pre-existent
possibilities. When it posits some one of these thinkable objects
as really existent it likewise produces nothing; it merely makes
an assertion which may be either true or false. But such idealism
as that of Kant and Cassirer would lose much of its attractive-
ness were it deprived of the picturesque and poetic notion of
mind, the supreme magician, endlessly producing and destroy-
ing worlds.
The concept of thing, according to Cassirer, is merely a su-
preme ordering concept of experience. At first we believe that
we know things directly; but reflection destroys this naive con-
fidence. The impression of the object comes to be separated
from the object itself, which becomes an unknowable and
elusive thing-5n-itself . But from the standpoint of critical ideal-
ism, Cassirer says, the concept of an object or thing is merely
18 Substanzbegriff und Funktionsbegriff (original German edition, 1910), 395.
CASSIRER AND METAPHYSICS 147
an instrument of knowledge; this amounts to saying that objects
are merely fictions, useful in stating propositions regarded as
true. Helmholtz took the position that "Each property or
quality of a thing is in reality nothing but its capacity to produce
certain effects on other things." On this Cassirer makes the
following comment:
We do not grasp the relations of absolute things from their interaction,
but we concentrate our knowledge of empirical connections into judg-
ments, to which we ascribe objective validity. Therefore the relative
properties do not signify in a negative sense that residuum of things that
we are able to grasp, but they are the first and positive ground of the
concept of reality. 19
We see then that, for Cassirer, the great objects of knowledge
are relations. Thing-concepts are merely means for stating rela-
tions. Now, undoubtedly this view is an attractive one; yet it
contains certain difficulties. How can there be relations without
relata? The weight of a body can perhaps be defined in terms
of its power of influencing other bodies, and the sense-qualities
are explained as mere powers, possessed by bodies, of producing
sensations. Nevertheless, size, shape, and relative position
cannot be taken from bodies without annihilating them. Rela-
tivism of this extreme sort constitutes a species of nihilism which
forces us to admit that we can form no conception of the real
whatsoever. Or, if we are left with truths, what are these truths
about? If realism is to be defended, it must be because not all
the properties of bodies are relative. Thus the numerical expres-
sion of size varies with the unit of measurement, but size is what
is measured; it is not the result of measurement. So, too,
although a body appears differently when viewed from differ-
ent angles, we need not deny that bodies possess determinate
shapes. The difficulty which I feel here is concerned with the
question whether such a complete relativism can really be in-
telligibly stated. At any rate, Cassirer and other idealists must
continue to use language which implies the existence of the
world of material things. Who are the knowers who "use the
thing-concept to organize their experiences?" Are they men?
19 SF, 306.
148 WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
And what is experience? From the standpoint of dualism, ex-
perience involves the interaction of minds and things; it is pri-
marily a matter of minds being affected by things. Experience is
itself not a thing made up of parts, and it is not the primary
object of knowledge; "we" do not "deal with" experience, but
rather we have experience of things and thus learn their ways.
The making of an object out of experience is, of course, the
irremovable mark of Kantian idealism.
The realist believes that physical things are more than mere
ordering concepts. It is true that physical things, whether those
dealt with by common sense or those postulated by physical
science, are not "given to sense," if we are to understand thereby
a wholly passive process. We must distinguish between sensing
and perceiving; the latter involves the use of "thing-concepts."
In postulating public and continuously existent things we neces-
sarily go beyond the sensations of the moment. The very con-
cept of really existent things, in contrast to things which are
merely thinkable, implies at least some degree of lawfulness of
behavior, in other words, some sort of interaction and causality.
Cassirer seems to say the same thing but with a different em-
phasis; he seems to think that what we must postulate is a
creation of our own minds, enjoying no absolute being. We
may, however, appeal to the parallel case of the religious man
who feels that he must postulate a God; he nevertheless postu-
lates this God as an eternal and indestructible being. Must we
not postulate nature as (very likely) an everlasting system of
things in perpetual interaction: some of their interactions con-
stitute the occasions for the occurrence of minds who know them
and interact with them in various ways? But for Cassirer there is
no self-existent nature of which we have real but imperfect
knowledge; hypothesis replaces hypothesis, and "reality" is
defined by the law of sequence, by which world-system over-
comes world-system; for him, there is progress towards com-
prehensiveness and consistency, but no progressive revelation
of a reality which is there, whether known or not.
WILLIAM CURTIS SWABEY
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY
3
I. K. Stephens
CASSIRER'S DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI
3
CASSIRER'S DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI
WHEN Locke cleared the philosophical stage of its
"props" in the form of innate ideas, he offered, as a sub-
stitute for this particular traditional basis of certainty, our im-
mediate perception of the agreement or disagreement of our
ideas. Whatever ground this theory might have supplied as a
basis for empirical certainty, however, was shattered by Hume
when he called attention to the fact that "relations of ideas" dif-
fer in principle from "relations of matters of fact." He admitted
that there are necessary relations between our ideas, but denied
that there are any such relations between "matters of fact." Since,
for Hume, knowledge must be based upon ideas, and certainty
must be based upon necessary connections, the only field in
which the mind can possibly attain certainty is in the field of the
"relations of ideas." Since relations of matters of fact lack this
character of necessity, our knowledge pertaining to this field of
experience is deprived of all logical grounds for a claim to
certainty.
The problem which Hume raises here is simply that concern-
ing the objective validity of the conceptual order of 'the mind. If
one desires to defend a claim to certainty in knowledge pertain-
ing to "matters of fact," it is incumbent upon him to show how
the mind can impose its concepts upon "matters of fact," upon
the "given in experience," in such a manner as to guarantee
that conceptual necessity will govern the given. He must show
how the relation between the ideas of the mind and matters
of fact can be so interpreted as to furnish a solid ground on the
basis of which the necessity which admittedly holds for rela-
tions of ideas can be guaranteed to hold in the mind's conceptual
152 I. K. STEPHENS
dealings with matters of fact. This is essentially the problem of
the a priori; and every significant doctrine of the a priori which
has been formulated in philosophy since Hume raised the prob-
lem has been designed as a basis for its solution.
Now this bit of skeptical infection, which Hume injected
into the thought stream of modern science and philosophy, first
took effective hold in the mind of Kant. After a long period of
intellectual insomnia and after many mental contortions and
gyrations, Kant finally came out of the attack with a new
Copernican Revolution in philosophy and with a brand-new
conception of the a priori, which he regarded as a sound basis for
the defense of the citadel of empirical certainty against Hume's
skepticism. Subsequent developments in the fields of science,
mathematics, and logic have, however, shaken the Kantian
foundation and torn gaping holes in his defenses. As these
defenses have disintegrated, under the bombardment of the
guns of recent developments in science, mathematics, and logic,
however, a long line of "successors to Kant" have appeared on
the scene to render valiant service in attempts to secure the
foundations and to repair the breaches, through some sort of
modification, or reformulation, or regrounding of the Kantian
a priori. It should be pointed out, however, that in spite of all
these gallant efforts, Hume's denial of certainty in the realm of
empirical knowledge still stands.
II
In that long line of "critical philosophers" who claim a philo-
sophical lineage from Kant, possibly no one is more worthy
of the distinction than is Cassirer. His penetrating and thorough
analysis of Kant's system of philosophy, his precise understand-
ing of just what Kant was attempting to do, and his profound
and extensive knowledge of the recent developments in science,
mathematics and logic, revealed to him many of the funda-
mental weaknesses in Kant's position; but, despite these facts,
he still seems to me to find more of permanent value in Kant's
system of philosophy than do most of those who claim to "stem
from Kant." His doctrine of the a priori, however, is not simply
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 153
Kant's doctrine reformulated with its elaborate architectonic
omitted; nor is it Kant's doctrine revised and brought up-to-
date in the light of recent developments in science, mathematics,
and logic. Kant's doctrine of the a priori and the ingenuity with
which Kant applied it in his attempt to solve Hume's problem
seem to be to Cassirer as they have been to many other
Kantians a source of inspiration and a useful guide in the
formulation of his own doctrine of the a priori. As he himself
puts it, he sees in Kant "not an end, but an ever new and fruit-
ful beginning for the criticism of knowledge." 1
With Kant, and with most Kantians, Cassirer is in funda-
mental agreement on at least two points with respect to the
a priori; (i) that the a priori is of the mind, and (ii) that all
certainty is based on logical necessity and that logical necessity
is grounded in the a priori. Also like Kant and most Kantians,
Cassirer conceives the major task of philosophy to be the critical
analysis of knowledge and the explication of the a priori; to the
accomplishment of this task he devotes his entire ponderous sys-
tem of philosophy. Nowhere in his voluminous writings, so
far as I have been able to determine, has Cassirer set forth, in
any sort of definite and summary statement, his doctrine of the
a priori. It pervades every phase of his philosophy and appears
on almost every page of his philosophical writings; but it is a
difficult and hazardous task to analyze it out of his system and
to pin it down in a definite statement which will do justice to
its total meaning and value. This difficulty is further increased
by two other factors, (i) His doctrine of the a priori seems to
have gone through at least two phases of development, and the
detailed results of these two different phases of its formulation
are significantly different, (ii) In each of these two formula-
tions his doctrine of the a priori is so inextricably bound up with
some other special aspect of his philosophical theory that it is
extremely difficult to isolate it and evaluate it, without going
thoroughly into these intimately associated theories.
The first phase of its development, set forth in his Sub-
stanzbegriff und Funktionsbegriff (1910), is formulated on the
1 Das Erkenntnisfroblem, Vol. I (1922), 14.
154 I- K. STEPHENS
basis of a very thorough critical analysis of the physical sciences
and of mathematics, and is thoroughly dominated by what
seems to me to be a tremendously exaggerated regard for the
position and the value of mathematics and the mathematical
concept in the theory of knowledge. Throughout this whole
work, as Gerard Heymans remarks, "Cassirer looks steadfastly
towards mathematics and insists that what is valid for this is
valid also for all the other sciences." 2 Here his doctrine of the
a priori is intricately bound up with his "mathematical theory of
the concept" and reflects a powerful influence from the mathe-
matical interest. Since another essay in this volume deals with
Cassirer's "theory of the mathematical concept,"* I shall omit
its discussion here and shall confine my discussion to those more
basic aspects of this earlier formulation which seem to carry over
into the later formulation.
This second formulation, which is contained primarily in
Cassirer's Philosophie der symbolischen Formen y is based on a
critical analysis of the whole of culture and is, in a definite
sense, a modification and extension of the earlier formulation
to constitute a basis for a "general theory of meaning." Here
Cassirer has relinquished, to some extent, his former emphasis
upon the place and value of mathematics and the mathematical
concept. And, though he still insists that "for such a theory of
meaning, mathematics and mathematical natural science will
always constitute a weighty and indispensable paradigm," he
admits that "it in no wise exhausts its content." 3 In this second
formulation, however, his doctrine of the a priori has found a
new "love" in the form of his elaborate doctrine of "signs."
Since any attempt to extricate it from its many "entangling
alliances" with this theory would lead far beyond the intended
scope of this paper, I shall feel justified here in avoiding also
any discussion of this aspect of his doctrine, except in so far as
it seems necessary in order to do justice to his doctrine of the
a priori.
Cassirer agrees with Kant that the correct approach to the
8 "Zur Cassirerschen Reform der Begriffslehre," Kant-Studien, Vol. 33 (1928),
109-128.
* EDITOR'S NOTE : Cf. Professor Harold R. Smart's essay infra on this subject.
3 "Zur Theorie des Begriffs," Kant-Studien. Vol. 33 (1928), 130.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 155
discovery of the a priori is through the method of a critical
analysis of knowledge. He emphasizes, over and over, the
futility of the attempts on the part of previous "metaphysical
philosophers" to deduce the "fundamental forms of the mind"
from some "original fundamental principle." The original diffi-
culty in such an attempt always consists in the fact that such
philosophers can determine neither the correct "beginning
point" nor the correct "end point." If they were granted these
two points, "they might succeed in connecting them through
the constant application of one and the same methodological
principle in a synthetic-deductive process." But since they have
neither "point," they are much in the same position as Kant's
speculative "dove," which succeeded in generating a tre-
mendous amount of action, but was unable to produce any for-
ward motion. As Cassirer correctly asserts, such philosophers
have always started out from "some definite metaphysically
hypostatized logical, or aesthetic, or religious principle," and
the results obtained from the process have never been worth
the efforts spent.
Granted, however, that the critical analysis of knowledge is
the only method that will lead to the discovery of the genu-
inely a priori elements of knowledge, the question naturally
arises, How is one to recognize it, when he comes upon it in
the analysis? Unless one has some distinguishing criterion in
terms of which to recognize the a priori when he finds it, he
would still be in the same position as the "metaphysical philoso-
pher" who had no "end point." Cassirer's answer to this ques-
tion, in the first formulation of his doctrine of the a priori,
would seem to run as follows: Since the a priori is an "element
of form," which is necessarily involved in every creative act of
mind, and since all knowledge is the product of such creative
activity, a critical analysis of knowledge will reveal the a priori
as that "element of form" which is always present in every
creative act of mind and which remains invariant through all the
changing and shifting contents of experience. It is to the end of
discovering just such a set of "invariant elements of form" that
he devotes that searching and exhaustive critical analysis of
science and mathematics set forth in his Substanzbegriff und
Funktionsbegriff.
156 I. K. STEPHENS
One of the most obvious aspects of science, says Cassirer, is
that it is a going concern, "a historically self-developing fact."
Kant's failure to recognize this fact becomes, according to
Cassirer, one of the chief sources of weakness in Kant's system.
Kant developed and formulated his doctrine of the a priori
under an undue predilection for Newtonian Mechanics, which
he seemed to regard as an example far exellence of pure
Reason, and as definitely finished. Scientific knowledge, how-
ever, is never static; it is in constant process of development;
and the one definite end toward which it seems ever to be
directed is the discovery of certain permanent elements in the
flux of experience, "that can be used as constants of theoretical
construction." Of such nature are the concepts of science: hy-
potheses, laws of nature, scientific principles, and the like. In
the history of this process, however, we are met with a constant
changing and shifting of just such seemingly constant elements.
What seems to be secure on one level of development is found
inadequate on the next level. One particular system of concepts
follows another in constant succession; hypotheses formulated
on one level yield their place to other hypotheses on the higher
level; scientific principles, which seem to be secure and firmly
established on one level of development, are supplanted by
other principles on the next level of development; and even
"the categories under which we consider the historical process
must themselves be regarded as mutable and susceptible to
change." But no system of concepts, no single hypothesis or
system of hypotheses, no scientific principle, and no category
which gives way to a successor is ever entirely annihilated. In
each case of substitution the earlier form is taken up into the
new form which must contain the answers to all the questions
raised under the previous form. This one feature, Cassirer
claims, guarantees the logical continuity from stage to stage;
establishes a logical connection between the earlier and the
latter; and "points to a common forum of judgment to which
both are subjected." 4
This "common forum of judgment," at the bar of which
4 Substance and. Function^ 268.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 157
every concept, hypothesis, principle, and category must justify
its relative claim to truth, consists in a set of logically prior
"supreme principles of experience in general," which must
always be present and effective as an "ultimate constant standard
of measurement" in terms of which these relative claims may be
measured and established.
Since we never compare the system of hypotheses in itself with the naked
facts in themselves, but always can only oppose one hypothetical system of
principles to another more inclusive, more radical system, we need for
this progressive comparison an ultimate constant standard of measure-
ment of supreme principles of experience in general. Thought demands
the identity of this logical standard of measurement amid all the changes
of what is measured. 5
Now, according to Cassirer, the critical analysis of knowledge
ends in just such a set of ultimate logical principles, a set of
"fundamental relations, upon which the content of all experi-
ence rests," and beyond which thought can not go, for "only in
them is thought itself and an object of thought possible." 6
They are the "universally valid formal functions (Fiwctions-
form) of rational and empirical knowledge" and constitute
a fixed system of conditions, and only relative to this system do all as-
sertions concerning the object as well as those concerning the ego, con-
cerning object and subject, gain an intelligible meaning. There is no
objectivity outside the frame of number and magnitude, permanence
and change, causality and reciprocal action ; all these determinations are
only the ultimate invariants of experience itself and therefore of all
reality which can be established in it and by it. 7
These forms, then, constitute the genuine a priori elements
of knowledge, for they are "those ultimate logical invariants
which lie at the foundation of every determination of a con-
nection in general according to natural law" and "only such
ultimate logical invariants can be called a priori."* To this list
of ultimate invariants, Cassirer adds "the categories of space
and time, magnitude, and the functional dependency of magni-
8 ibid.
8 Substanzbegriff und Funktionsbegriff. (1910), 410.
4 ii.
357.
158 I. K. STEPHENS
tudes, etc.," since they, too, are "established as such elements
of form, which cannot be lacking in any empirical judgment or
system of judgments." 9 This group of "logical invariants" con-
stitutes that system of "unchanging elements demanded by all
scientific thought" and "fulfill a requirement clearly urged by
inductive procedure itself." 10 They also seem to constitute the
basic structural form of the mind, and the basic principles of
that "transcendental logic" upon which alone a truly universal
logic can be developed. For Cassirer insists that "a truly uni-
versal logic can be constructed only upon a 'transcendental*
logic, i.e., a logic of thought-objects." Such a logic, he insists, is
in diametrical opposition to the formal logic, which, as Kant
defined it, has as its chief excellence the fact that it "abstracts
from all experience of objects and their differences." 11 In this
traditional formal logic, the concept is a mere "form emptied
of all its objective content and meaning}" whereas, in his "truly
universal logic," concepts are "concrete universals" which not
only "embrace" but "comprehend" the particular subordinated
to them.
Now when Cassirer defines the a priori as "those ultimate
logical invariants which lie at the foundation of every determi-
nation of a connection in general according to natural law," he
designates this as "a strictly limited meaning of the a friori"
It seems that a more comprehensive meaning of the term would
include all those concepts, categories, and interpretive principles
which are implicitly contained in this set of "ultimate forms,"
all arranged in a logical structure of superordination and sub-
ordination. The task of science is to discover these concepts,
categories, etc.; and the procedure by which it accomplishes
this task is the constant comparison of these various concepts,
hypotheses, etc., with this "constant standard of measurement
of supreme principles of experience in general." And the
method followed here, says Cassirer, "shows the same 'rational 7
structure as was found in mathematics." 12 Induction and deduc-
1 Substance and F unction > 269.
"Ibid., 268.
M "Zur Theorie des Begriffs," Kant-Studien. Vol. 33 (1928), 131.
"Substance and Function y 269.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 159
tion do not differ in their goal, but only in the means of reaching
their goal.
"The tendency to something unchanging, to something
permanent in the coming and going of sensuous phenomena, is
thus characteristic of inductive thought no less than of mathe-
matical thought." 13 Genuine theoretically guided induction is
never satisfied, says Cassirer, short of the establishment of a
connection in the given "which can be ... clearly surveyed ac-
cording to the principle of its construction." 14 All thought is a
process of objectifying. Its function and purpose, both in induc-
tion and in deduction, is to establish unity in the flux of sensory
experience. This can be done only on the basis of those trans-
cendental forms which constitute the structural unity of the
mind. In so far, then, as induction, through its method of con-
tinually testing its conceptual devices by constant reference to
that body of "ultimate invariants" is able to develop concepts,
hypotheses, etc., which stem logically from this system of in-
variant principles, and to apply them in its conceptual dealings
with "matters of fact," it can gain knowledge of empirical
objects which possesses the same degree of necessity and cer-
tainty as does knowledge of the objects of mathematics. For
"we do not know 'objects' as if they were already independently
determined and given as objects, but we know objectively, by
producing certain limitations and by fixating certain permanent
elements and connections within the uniform flow of experi-
ence." 15 The superiority of the mathematical concept over the
ordinary generic concept, its "greater value for knowledge," its
"superior objective meaning and validity," seems to be due to
its closer logical affinity for this set of "supreme principles."
In the first formulation of his doctrine of the a priori,
Cassirer's attempt to solve Hume's problem seems to have
turned out to be much the same as the attempt made by Kant,
namely, to show how, at least in the realm of mathematics and
the exact sciences, synthetic propositions a priori are possible.
He seems to have become conscious later, however, that he had
18 Ibid., 249.
14 ibid., 253.
303.
160 I. K. STEPHENS
committed the same fallacy of which he accused Kant, i.e., he
had confined his critical analysis within too narrow limits. For,
if the a priori is the "necessary condition for all meaningful
experience/' and its function is to guarantee the unity of all
knowledge, then it must be present and effective wherever
there is meaningful experience and a claim to knowledge. The
world of mathematics and the exact sciences is not the beginning,
but the end of this "objectifying process," and its roots reach
down into earlier levels of "fashioning." Thus these a priori
forms, which come to clearest expression on the level of scien-
tific knowledge, must apply no less, mutatis mutandis, to all the
fundamental functions of mind on all the lower levels of cul-
ture and in all its special "phases." Thus, for Cassirer, in the
second attempt to formulate his doctrine of the a priori,
The Critique of Reason becomes, therefore, the Critique of Culture.
It seeks to show how all the content of culture, in so far as it is more
than a mere single content, in so far as it is grounded in a formal prin-
ciple, presupposes an original act of the mind. Herein the fundamental
thesis of Idealism finds its essential and complete verification. So long
as philosophical consideration has reference simply to the analysis of
purely formal knowledge and is limited to that task, just so long the force
of the naive realistic world view cannot be broken. 1 *
An initial clue to Cassirer's position here is revealed in his
statement of the demand made upon critical philosophy. The
demand is
... to include the various methodological tendencies of knowledge, in
all their recognized originality and independence, in a system in which
the individual members, in exactly their necessary variety, are reciprocally
conditioned and required. The postulate of a kind of pure functional
unity now enters in the place of the postulate of the unity of the sub-
strate and the unity of origin, by which the ancient concept of being
was essentially governed. From this there arises a new task for the phil-
osophical criticism of knowledge. It must follow as a whole and survey
as a whole the course which the special sciences have traveled individually.
It must put the question, whether the intellectual symbols under which
the special disciplines consider and describe reality are to be thought as
18 Philosofhie der symbotischen Former*. Vol. I (1923), n.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 161
a simple juxtaposition or whether they can be understood as different
expressions of one and the same basic mental junction. And if this latter
presupposition should be verified, then there arises the further task of
setting up the universal conditions of this function and of clarifying the
principle by which it is governed. 17
In the light of this statement, it would seem that Cassirer's
first fundamental assumption is that knowledge, which philoso-
phy is to subject to critical analysis, is necessarily a unity; and,
furthermore, that this unity must be assured and explained in
terms of certain "basic mental functions" and a "rule" which
"governs the concrete multiplicity and variety of these knowl-
edge functions," integrating the totality of their products into
an organic whole. These "basic mental functions" for which all
the varieties of intellectual symbols are to be regarded as differ-
ent expressions, together with the "rule" which governs these
functions, seem now to constitute, for Cassirer, the fundamental
a priori elements of knowledge. The categories, which Kant
considered as the "original concepts of the understanding," as
its basic a priori forms and the necessary conditions for the possi-
bility of experience, are here relegated to a subordinate level
in the structure of the a priori. Kant's error, both as to the
number and nature of these categories, says Cassirer, was due to
the fact that he did not know at that time what the subsequent
developments in "critical and idealistic logic" have made com-
pletely clear on that point, namely, that
the forms of judgment mean only unified and living motives of thought,
which pervade all the diversity of its special forms and are constantly en-
gaged in the creation and formulation of ever new categories. The richer
and more plastic these variations prove to be, the more do they testify
to the individuality and to the originality of the logical function out of
which they arise. 18
In the light of these considerations, critical analysis must,
according to Cassirer, be extended to the whole of culture, to all
its different "phases" or "provinces," Art, Language, Myth,
17 Ibid., 8-9. Italics are mine.
18 Das Erkenntnisfroblem. Vol. I (1922), 18.
162 I. K. STEPHENS
Religion, and Science, and to all the different levels of its de-
velopment. For,
It is proper not only for Science, but for Language, for Art, and for
Religion, that they supply the building materials, from which is con-
structed for us not only the world of the "real," but also the world of
the "mental," the world of the "ego." We cannot insert them in the
given world as simple creations, but must concewe them as functions, by
means of which every specific fashioning of Being and every special
division and differentiation of the same is carried out. 19
Each of these special "provinces" is determined by a special
"point of view" which the mind "freely takes" with respect
to the given in experience. This special point of view determines
a special function which governs the mind's dealings with the
given, in that special province. It determines the formulation
of the categories and the concepts by means of which the mind
interprets and expresses the real from that specific "point of
view." In each of these special provinces, therefore, we get a
manifestation of "one side of the real." And in all these prov-
inces, taken together as a unity, we get a complete picture of
the totality of the real. True, the pictures of the real presented
from these different "points of view" are very dissimilar. But
this is just what we should expect. For,
Since the means utilized by these functions in the performance of these
acts are different, and since the standards and the criteria which each
separate one presupposes and applies are different, the result is different.
The scientific conception of truth and of reality is different from that
of Religion or of Art thus it is indeed a special and incomparable
fundamental relation which is, not so much indicated, as rather estab-
lished in them between the "inner" and the "outer," between the Being
of the ego and of the world. 20
The results obtained in each of these provinces must, there-
fore, be measured and evaluated in terms of its own standards
and not in terms of the standards and demands of any other.
And only in such manner of dealing with them can the question
10 Philosophic der symbolischen Formen. Vol. I (1923), 24.
*lbit.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 163
be raised "whether and how all these different forms of world-
comprehension and I-comprehension can be unified if they do
not indeed portray one and the same self-existing 'thing', they
at least perfect (ergdnzen) a totality, a unified system of mental
performance (Tuns)" 21
Now if, under these conditions, the unity of knowledge,
which it is the specific function of the a priori to guarantee,
seems to fall apart into several separate provinces of knowledge,
each with its own a priori forms, its special categories, standards
and criteria, which apply only within its own special field of
"construction," Cassirer informs us that it is just as much the
function of the a priori to preserve this diversity as it is to
guarantee the unity of knowledge. This "unity in diversity'" he
says, is an essential demand of consciousness. In spite of this
essential diversity, there is still a "unity of meaning" which
binds all these provinces together into a "unity of systems"
without destroying the separate and distinctive meaning and
value of any system. This, he insists, is just what an analysis of
culture reveals.
For every one of these "connections of meaning" (Bedeutungszusam-
menhange), Language as well as scientific knowledge, Art as well as
Myth, possesses its own constitutive principle which impresses all the
special fashionings in it as if with its seal. ... It belongs to the essence
of consciousness itself, that no content can be posited in it without, posit-
ing, at the same time, through this simple act of positing, a complex of
other contents with it. 22
Myth, Art, Language, and Science are, in this sense, impressions to
Being (Pragungen zum Sein): They are not simple portrayals of a
present reality, but they exhibit the great lines of direction of mental
movement, of the ideal process, in which the real as one and many is
constituted for us as a multiplicity of configurations, which are still,
ultimately, held together through a unity of meaning. 23
One ground on which Cassirer rejects the single system of
the structure of the mind, which speculative philosophers of
21 Ibid.
22 ibid., 3 i.
23 Ibid., 43. Italics mine.
164 I. K. STEPHENS
the past have attempted to deduce from a "single original
principle" and to arrange in a unique progressive series, is the
fact that such a system is inadequate for the explanation of this
diversity. Explained in terms of such a system, the diversity
gets swallowed up in the unity of the system. Instead of such a
system, says Cassirer, critical philosophy demands, and the
analysis of culture reveals, a complex system in which
Every form is, so to speak, assigned a special plane within which it
operates and in which it unfolds, with complete independence, its own
specific individuality but just in the totality of these ideal modes of
operation appear, at the same time, definite analogies, definite typical
modes of relating, which can be singled out and described. 24
Now as a means of explaining how all these various levels
and phases of culture are integrated into a logically unified
system of systems, Cassirer appeals to that set of "fundamental
relations upon which the content of all experience rests." These
logical invariants, he claims, permeate all the forms which
determine all the fashionings of experience on all the different
levels and in all the different phases of culture. From the
lowest level of "Expression" in terms of mythical concepts,
through the level of "Representation" in terms of the concepts
of language, to the highest level of "pure Meaning" compre-
hended in terms of the "concepts of natural law," he traces the
development of culture. In doing so, he offers an incredible
array of evidence in support of his claim that the same "motive
of construction" and the same basic "structural form of the
mind" persist through all these different levels of develop-
ment. Although he admits that, in the advancement from stage
to stage in the process of development, certain changes and
"transformations," certain "characteristic metamorphoses"
occur, he still insists that these "supreme principles" remain
fundamentally the same, though appearing, on each successive
level, under a "new form and covering." With every transition
from a lower to a higher level of culture, there occurs a "trans-
formation" in the "point of view" which the mind takes. This
29.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 165
transformation gives rise to new demands and requires new
"norms" in terms of which to meet them. As the development
proceeds, there is a constant "shifting of mental meaning" and
"out of every one of these shiftings there arises a new 'total
meaning' of reality." 25
Even on the mythical level of culture, says Cassirer, we find
exhibited, in all its various "fashionings," a certain definite
"mental tendency," a "fixed direction of thought," which the
mind follows in all its expressions of experience on this level.
This fixed direction of thought he attributes to the "form of
the mythical consciousness," which is "nothing more than the
unity of the mental principles by which all its constructions, in
all their variety and in all their vast empirical richness, are
ultimately governed." 26 Also on this level of "Expression,"
there is a "unity of point of view" under the dominance of
which man's "mytho-religious intuition" shapes all the con-
ceptual devices by means of which he carries out the organiza-
tion of society as well as the organization of the world. And
although this "point of view" may be more definitely deter-
mined in each particular society by the living conditions under
which that society exists and develops, we can clearly detect,
as a common element in all of them, certain "general and per-
vading motives of construction." 27
The mental principles which the mind employs in carrying
out these constructions are, Cassirer claims, the general cate-
gories which constitute the fundamental forms of the social
consciousness on this level of cultural development. They re-
veal, he says, "the lawfulness of consciousness," the unity of a
"structural form of the mind," and are just as genuinely a priori
as are the fundamental forms of "knowledge" exhibited on the
various successive higher levels of cultural development. They
are, in fact, the logical ancestors of those forms 5 for all those
forms of culture, Art, Law, Science, and all the rest, had their
genesis in this mythical consciousness. Not one of them had, in
85 Philosophie der symbolischen Formen. Vol. Ill (1929), 523.
96 Philosophic der symbolischen Formen. Vol. II (1925), 16.
*lbid., 220.
1 66 I. K. STEPHENS
the beginning, anything like a distinct and clearly defined form.
They can all be traced back to a primitive stage in which they
all existed together in the immediate and undifferentiated unity
of mythical consciousness. And out of this undifferentiated
state, all those fundamental forms of knowledge, space, time,
number, continuity, property, and the rest, have been de-
veloped.
They are the most general forms of perception, which constitute the
unity of consciousness as such, and, therefore, just as well that of mythi-
cal consciousness as that of pure knowledge. In this respect it can be
said that each of these forms must have run through a previous mythical
stage before receiving its definite logical form and impress. 28
It is obvious that the world picture presented on the level
of Myth is quite different from that presented on the scientific
level. This difference, Cassirer claims, is not to be explained on
the assumption that these world-pictures are constructed on the
basis of a difference in the "nature" or the "quality" of the
categories used, but on the basis of a difference in the
"modality" of the categories. Space, time, number, causality,
and all the rest of the basic forms of consciousness are present
and effective on the mythical level just as they are on all the
higher levels of culture, but with a difference in "modality."
By the "quality" of a relation he means "the special manner of
connecting, by means of which it creates a series in the whole of
consciousness," such as is exemplified in the form of "together"
as compared with "successive," the "simultaneous" as con-
trasted with "successive connection." By the "modality" of a
relation, however, he means its "meaning for the whole"
(Sinnganzen) . This character of a relation "possesses its own
nature, its own self-contained formal law. Thus, for example,
that universal relation which we call time represents equally an
element of theoretical scientific knowledge, and also an essential
moment for definite structures of aesthetic consciousness." 29 Al-
though it may seem that these two senses in which the concept
d., 78.
P kilo sof hie der symbolischen Formen, Vol. I (19*3), 39.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 167
time is used, namely, as the uniform measure of all change and
as the rhythmical measure of music, have nothing in common
except the name} nevertheless, says Cassirer,
This unity of naming contains in itself a unity of meaning, at least
in so far as there is posited in both that universal and abstract quality
which we designate by the expression "succession." But it is obviously
a special "manner," indeed a unique "mode" of succession which rules
in the consciousness of natural law, as the law of the temporal form
of events, and that which rules in the comprehension of the rhythmical
measure of a tone structure. 80
Now the transition from a lower to a higher level in the de-
velopment of culture is always the result of a "transformation"
or a "permutation" in the "modality" of those various funda-
mental forms "within which alone thought and its world are
possible." This "permutation" in the "meaning for the whole"
seems to arise out of a new "point of view" with respect to ex-
perience. And experience interpreted from this new point of
view gives a new world-picture. In order to express the new
relations and meanings which emerge with this transformation
in the modality of those fundamental relational forms, the
mind is under necessity of creating a new set of concepts. Even
the old concepts that are retained on the new level take on an
entirely different meaning from that which they express with
respect to the lower level. For instance, the concept of "truth"
and the concept of "reality" have a meaning for science which
is entirely different from that which they express on the level
of myth. It is the function of the concepts utilized on each level
of culture, however, to express with objective validity the
relations and meanings which are characteristic of that particular
level, i.e., those relations and meanings logically determined
by the specific formal modalities operative on that particular
level. The function of thought on all the different levels of
culture is to "objectify}" and this is done in each case by
"producing certain limitations and fixating certain permanent
elements and connections within the uniform flow of experi-
90 ibid.
168 I. K. STEPHENS
ence." This task is performed by means of the concepts used.
Thus the concepts used on any particular level of culture ex-
press the meanings and fixate the relations peculiar to that
particular level with a sufficient degree of logical necessity to
guarantee their objective validity. But since the concepts uti-
lized by the mind on the different levels are different, and
express different meanings and relations, the world-picture
presented on the different levels will be different. All these dif-
ferent world-pictures, however, present different views of the
one total reality. And all these different processes of objectifying
contribute to one and the same ultimate end, namely, the re-
duction of the world of mere impressions to a logically in-
tegrated objective world.
The different creations of mental culture, Language, Scientific
Knowledge, Myth, Art, and Religion, in all their inner variety, become,
therefore, members of one great problem of connection manifold tend-
encies, all of which are related to the one goal of transforming the
passive world of mere impressions . . . into a world of pure mental
expression. 81
The problem posed by Hume, however, was not the problem
of developing in the mind a system of ideas with their necessary
connections, but the problem of finding a logical basis on which
to guarantee that these necessary connections of ideas must hold
in the mind's dealings with matters of fact. In his first formula-
tion of his doctrine of the a priori, Cassirer seems to attempt
to solve this problem, at least in part, by an implicit denial that
any such problem exists. He seems to think that the problem
arose for Hume because he, like Kant in the first part of his
Critique of Pure Reason, was assuming an untenable dualism
between a "mundus sensibilis'* and a "mundus intelligibilis"
In the second formulation, however, he seems to realize more
fully that there is some necessity of explaining how and why
there must be a necessary harmony between the conceptual order
of the mind and the "uniform flow of experience." Here the
"symbol" becomes the mediating device which seems to turn
the trick. Symbols, he seems to think, are created by "a pure
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 169
activity of the mind" and are specifically and peculiarly de-
signed by the mind to perform this feat. "All those symbols
appear from the beginning with a definite claim to objective
value. They all transcend the circle of the mere phenomena of
consciousness and claim, in opposition to them, to represent a
universal validity." 32 In fact, their "structure" represents the
"essential kernel of the objective, of the real." Every symbolic
structure, furthermore, possesses a characteristic "double
nature." On the one side, it is essentially bound to the sensuous;
but "its subjection to the sensuous contains in itself at the same
time a freedom from the sensuous," an essential connection with
the mental, with the conceptual order of the mind.
"In every linguistic 'sign', in every mythical or artistic
'image' appears a mental content which, in and for itself, tran-
scends the sensuous, permuted Into the form of the sensuous,
the visible, the audible, the tastable." 33
Cassirer attributes to Pierre Duhem the credit for being the
first to show that only within the structure of a definite symbolic
world is it possible to approach the world of physical reality.
It was his claim that what first appears to us as a purely factual
manifold, as a factual variety of sense impressions, gains phys-
ical meaning and value only when it is portrayed in the
province of numbers. This portrayal, however, is wrongly
interpreted, says Cassirer, if we think it simply consists in "sub-
stituting for the individual contents given in experience contents
of another kind and coinage. To every special class of experi-
ence, is co-ordinated a special substrate which is the complete
expression of its genuine, its essential 'reality'." 34
Now it is Cassirer's claim that the function of mind in all its
objectifying processes is to establish harmony between opposites.
This harmony, however, is essentially different from the mere
matter of agreement, and requires a genuine synthetic act of the
mind. It seems to be the function of the symbol to mediate this
synthesis and the function of the concept to "fix" the connec-
tions established in the synthesis. For the first work of the con-
88 ibid., 4 i.
34 Philosophic der symbolischen Formen. Vol. Ill (1929), 478.
ijo I. K. STEPHENS
cept, he asserts, is "to grasp, as such, the moments upon which
rests the organization and order of perceptual reality and to
recognize them in their specific meaning. The connections which
are posited implicitly in perceptual existence in the form of mere
'given-withness' (Mitgegebenheii) are developed from it. . . ," 35
Furthermore, "The logical concept does nothing more than fix
the lawful order which already lies in the phenomena them-
selves y it follows consciously the rule set up, which experience
follows unconsciously." 36 It is the mind itself, guided by the
logical demands of its "supreme logical functions" which "sets
up" the rule which the concept follows consciously and experi-
ence follows unconsciously. Thus those functions seem to de-
termine both the conceptual order of the mind and also the
"uniform flow of experience," and do it in such a fashion that
there must be complete harmony between these two "op-
posites." The mind's task is to make a synthesis of the two and
it accomplishes this feat by means of the concept. For,
Such a "synthesis of opposites" lies concealed in every genuine physical
concept and in every physical judgment. For we are always concerned
with referring two different forms of the manifold to one another and,
in a certain measure, penetrating them with one another. We always
proceed from a mere empirical, a "given" plurality; but the goal of the
theoretical construction of the concept is directed at changing it into a
rationally surveyable, into a "constructive" plurality. 87
On the lower levels of culture, these concepts and symbols
are so completely immersed in the sensuous that it is difficult
to detect in them any connection with those "fundamental func-
tions" of the mind which they express. As the process of objecti-
fying advances from the lower to the higher levels, however,
the mind gradually succeeds in extricating them from their
subjection to and their contamination with the sensuous and in
creating concepts and symbols which reveal more and more the
genuine nature of those functions. On the lower levels, we see
those forms only "as if through a glass darkly," only in
their distorted "modalities;" but when the highest level is
85 Ibid.y 330.
M I***., 333-
87 Ibid., 480.
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 171
reached, the level of pure mathematics and the pure math-
ematical natural sciences, where they have "put off the cor-
ruptible and put on incorruption," we shall "see them face to
face" and recognize them for what they genuinely are, "pure
meanings." This is the ultimate end towards which the whole
creative process is directed, the "one far-off divine event to
which the whole creation moves." For this is the realm in which
the bond between "concept" and "reality" is severed with complete
consciousness. Above "reality," as the reality of phenomena, is raised
a new realm: The realm of pure meaning; and in it henceforth is
grounded all certainty and all constancy, all final truth of knowledge.
On the other hand, the world of "ideas," of "meanings," although it
renounces all "similarity" with the empirical sensuous world, it cannot
dispense with its relation to it. 88
Ill
This is, admittedly, an inadequate and in some respects, no
doubt, an erroneous exposition of Cassirer's doctrine of the
a priori. It has omitted many aspects of his doctrine which, if
taken into consideration, might effect a "transformation" in
the "modality" of those aspects that are considered here. My
first reaction to the whole delineation of his doctrine of the
a priori is simply to regard it as an extremely thorough, meticu-
lously painstaking attempt on the part of another brilliant
philosopher to elaborate and defend a theory of the priori
which is, from the beginning, palpably indefensible. A careful
analysis of his doctrine, however, reveals many points which,
if taken in isolation from the rest of his system or if given a
slightly different interpretation from that which his whole
system demands, would appear perfectly sound and thoroughly
defensible. This slight difference in interpretation is, however,
to use Whitehead's expression, "just that slight difference
which makes all the difference in the world."
To his claim that the a priori is of the mind and is the basis
of all necessity and of all certainty in knowledge, I readily
agree. But I contend that his conception of the essential nature
of the a priori is untenable, both in the light of logic and from
18 ibid., 527.
172 I. K. STEPHENS
the standpoint of what is revealed in a critical analysis of
knowledge. Furthermore, such a conception of the a priori
is inadequate as a basis for explaining and guaranteeing that
type of necessity which grounds the only type of certainty which
the mind can have with respect to matters of fact. An analysis
of knowledge does not reveal any set of invariant principles
which are necessarily common to all thinking minds and which,
by some inherent logical power which they possess, are opera-
tive in any of the mind's categories and concepts in such a
fashion as to force their character of logical necessity upon the
given in experience. The a priori character of any concept or
category of the mind is not derived from any logical connection
which it may have with any fundamental set of "basic func-
tions ;" but from the definitive attitude of the mind which gives
rise to this conceptual order and determines the characteristics
which the given must exhibit, if it is to be classified under the
category or the concept determined by that definitive attitude.
The only certainty the mind can have with respect to any sensory
datum yet to be given rests upon the mind's certainty with
respect to the meaning of its own concepts and categories. This
meaning is established and determined by the mind itself, by
virtue of the definitive attitudes which it takes, and can be
strictly and consistently adhered to regardless of what may be
given in experience. This definitive attitude determines the
criteria which any given datum must satisfy if it is to be in-
terpreted under the concept or under the category which
embodies and expresses these criteria. Failing to satisfy these
criteria, the given datum is excluded from such classification
and interpretation. For every classification which the mind
makes is an implicit interpretation. But every interpretation is
an implicit prediction with respect to some subsequent datum of
experience. The interpretation of any set of sensory data under
any definite concept or category implicitly asserts that such a
set of data will be followed by certain other definitely specifiable
data, namely, those which are implicitly demanded by the
definitive criteria which constitute the essential meaning of the
concept or the category under which the original data were
classified. The only necessity which the mind can impose on the
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 173
given, therefore, is the necessity which the given is under of
conforming to certain definitive criteria of the mind or else
being excluded from classification and interpretation under the
specific concept or category which those definitive criteria es-
tablish. The mind can know, then, prior to the experiencing of
any particular datum of experience, the character which that
particular datum must exhibit if it is to be classified under any
definite concept or category. The mind knows this because the
mind itself, by its own definitive attitudes, determines those
criteria to which the datum must conform, or else y and can make
them hold regardless of what the given datum may or may not
do. Thus all the necessity which the mind is capable of imposing
on the given, through the use of its "conceptual order," is
derived (i) from the character of its own legislative acts which
determine the essential meaning of its conceptual devices and,
(ii) from the alternative which the mind has of excluding from
classification under any concept or category any given element
of experience which does not conform to the criteria which are
established by those legislative acts for the concept or the cate-
gory in question. Such necessity, therefore, does not rest upon
some logical connection which these concepts and categories
have with some "fixed system of conditions," relative to which
alone any assertion concerning anything whatsoever can have
any meaning. This contention of Cassirer reflects the powerful
influence of his undue predilection for mathematics, and also his
misconception of the genuine nature of mathematics itself.
There is a definite sense in which the a 'priori principles of
knowledge may be considered as the "formal structure of the
mind," but not the sense in which Cassirer uses the expression.
Those initial principles and criteria of interpretation which
formulate the mind's definitive attitudes constitute the formal
conceptual structure with which the mind meets and interprets
the given in experience. It is in this way that the mind organizes
and systematizes the chaotic flux of the given into a predictable
and intelligible world. This conceptual "structure of the mind,"
however, is neither an inherent structure of all thinking minds }
nor is it by any means invariant. Even those most fundamental
categories of the mind, those which formulate the mind's de-
174 I. K. STEPHENS
finitive attitudes that determine the different types of the real,
are not invariant, at least not in the sense that they must remain
the same regardless of any change in the complexity of the
given which the mind must encounter} or regardless of any
possible change in the dominant interests and purposes of
society. In fact, it seems to be carrying the defense of a claim
to the point of absurdity to insist that those "rational functions"
which Cassirer designates as "the ultimate invariants of ex-
perience itself" have remained invariant throughout the history
of culture. Furthermore, if the character of invariance be desig-
nated as the criterion of the a priori, I doubt that any single
"element of form," not even excepting such forms as Space,
Time, Number and Magnitude, Permanence and Change,
Causality and Reciprocal Interaction would qualify as a priori;
for these fundamental forms have certainly undergone rather
remarkable change in the process of man's cultural develop-
ment from the primitive level to its present state. Cassirer does,
of course, allow for certain "shiftings of intellectual accent"
and certain "modal transformations" in the process j but I doubt
whether the difference between the primitive man's vague sense
of time and of space and the modern scientist's conception of a
fused space-time can be explained in terms of such "shiftings"
and "transformations ;" or whether man's hazy anthropo-
morphic conception of a mythical causal agent could be recon-
ciled in this way with the purely formal definition of cause as it
is used today by the theoretical scientist. If the change be ex-
plained in terms of a refinement in definition, it can be said in
reply that a relation is what it is by definition, and any refine-
ment in definition means a change in the nature of the relation.
Even those forms are creations of the mind; and what the mind
has created it can change when the demand arises. And the de-
mand for such a change is, usually, not merely a logical demand,
but a practical one, a demand created by the appearance of some
new type of the "given" for the proper interpretation of which
the previous forms have proven inadequate.
The relative permanence of these forms and also their a
priori character I would readily grant; but I would deny that
they are invariant and also that invariance is the criterion for
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 175
the determination of the a priori character of any form. It may
be that, to paraphrase Wordsworth, "Each hath had elsewhere
its origin and commeth from far" and that each does come
"trailing clouds of glory." Such clouds of glory may be marks
of their ancient origin j but neither the clouds of glory nor its
ancient origin is a mark of its a priori character. In, the case of
these forms, as in the case of all other forms and "functional re-
lations of rational and empirical knowledge," whatever char-
acter of the a priori they may possess is due to a definitive
and legislative act of the mind itself. Whatever degree of
permanence or invariance they may show is explicable, I think,
on the grounds of their practical value as instruments for han-
dling the given, and not on the grounds that they satisfy some
"ideal logical demand." Furthermore, if invariance and an-
tiquity of origin be sure marks of the a priori, then I see no
grounds on which to exclude the category of substance, against
which Cassirer so vigorously inveighs throughout his entire
system j for certainly this category has as ancient and as honor-
able a history as can be claimed for any of those "functional
relations" to which he attributes the a priori character.
It is true, as Cassirer claims, that Culture, in all its different
forms and on all its different levels, is a creation of the mind.
It includes all those devices, both mental and physical, which
the mind has created for the purpose of handling the given in
experience and of reducing that given to an ordered and in-
telligible world. It seems to be the characteristic function of the
mind to create just such conceptual tools and to use them to
this definite end. The "original motive" which lies behind this
"constructive activity," however, is not a "will to logic," but
a "will to live," a will to satisfy certain vital and emotional
interests of the organism. And it is the "will to live" rather
than a "will to logic" which tends to determine those definitive
attitudes of the mind and, thus, the nature and meaning of its
categories and concepts. Cassirer, it seems, would insist that
There's a Logic that shapes our concepts,
Rough-hew them how we will.
I would insist on substituting for "logic" certain vital and emo-
176 I. K. STEPHENS
tional interests of the organism. For the thinking organism,
confronted with the chaotic welter of experience, is confronted
likewise with a practical necessity of doing something about it.
Otherwise I doubt that any tendency to think would ever have
arisen. The ability to think is, I take it, an evolutionary product,
and has developed in the human species as a result of its sur-
vival value. The tendency to regard man as primarily a "think-
ing being" rather than as an "acting being" has led to many
misinterpretations of the function of mind. Mind's function
is not that of "harmonizing thought and Being," but rather that
of adjusting the organism to the chaotic flux of experience in
ways that will preserve and promote certain vital and emotional
interests which the organism has. This function it performs by
taking certain definitive attitudes towards the given in experi-
ence and in formulating these attitudes into definite categories
and concepts which will serve as efficient guides to the organism
in its processes of adjustment. Thinking is only one means
of solving these problems of adjustment - y and most beings, who
have the ability to think, generally use it only when more
primitive means prove inadequate. The human mind itself is
only man's ability to create and to use conceptual devices as a
means to that end. Such conceptual devices are created by the
mind, usually, just to serve that end. They may be changed or
even discarded when they prove inadequate to serve this
purpose or when the mind hits upon other devices which serve
the purpose better. The standard against which the mind is
constantly checking its categories, concepts, hypotheses, etc., is
not a set of invariant logical functions, but usually the practical
results derived from their application to the flux of experience
and the consonance of those results with experience itself.
Cassirer admits that "No number . . . 'is' anything other than
it is made in certain conceptual definitions." This is true, of
course j but the same can be truly said of all the concepts and
categories which the mind uses. The superior value which
number and all other mathematical concepts have for deductive
purposes rests upon the exactness and precision with which they
may be defined. Again, the relations in terms of which math-
ematical concepts are defined are quantitative relations and,
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 177
therefore, susceptible to more definite and precise expression
and analysis than are those with which ordinary classificatory
concepts are defined. The very essence of number is simply a
definite position in a purely logical series. Number is not a
"concrete universal," but a purely abstract universal, a purely
logical entity, the quintessence of abstraction. The relata them-
selves are creations of the mind and, for that reason, the mind
is able to force them to conform to relations established by its
concepts. The given sensory data of experience, however, are
not created by the mind and cannot be forced to conform to
those relations. They either do, or they do not. If they do not,
the mind has the alternative of excluding them from classifica-
tion under the concept which established those relations. Upon
this ability of the mind to formulate concepts by definition, and
to reject from classification and interpretation under those con-
cepts any datum which does not conform to the criteria which
their definitions establish rests the a priori character of all con-
cepts, mathematical as well as the ordinary generic concepts.
Mathematics is, in its entirety, a creation of the mind and is
the most efficient tool for handling certain types of the given
those types in which the quantitative aspects are more important
than are the qualitative aspects that the mind has ever created.
Mathematics, however, demands nothing more than that, if a
certain relation holds among a certain set of entities, be they
abstract or be they concrete entities, then certain other sets of
relations must also hold among those same entities. But those
certain other sets of relations which must hold are implications
of the definition which established the meaning of the original
relation. If three points in a plane are arranged in the form
of a right triangle these are all pure abstractions , then the
square on the hypotenuse must be equal to the sum of the
squares on the other two sides. The certainty of the statement
contained in the "then" clause of this theorem is assured by the
implications of the definition of a right triangle. The relations
stated in the "then" clause can be known to hold a priori, neces-
sarily, only on the ground that the mind is in position to exclude
from the class of right triangles all triangles which do not
conform to the criteria specifically stated or implied in the
178 I. K. STEPHENS
definition of a right triangle. If we substitute for these abstract
entities certain concrete entities, a triangular plot of ground for
the plane and fence posts for the abstract points, we know that
the same relations must hold among these entities also. If we
measure accurately the distances between the posts along the
shorter sides of the triangle and, upon these measurements,
calculate accurately the length of the supposed hypotenuse and,
then, upon these calculations, buy the wire to fence the piece
of ground, we may come out several rods short. Such a disap-
pointing and inconvenient result does not constitute an empirical
demonstration of the falsity of the Euclidean theorem, but
demonstrates the falsity of the original assumption that the
posts were related in the form of a right triangle. It is just this
character of mathematical concepts which makes them so useful
as means of discovering relations among concrete entities which
would likely never be discovered otherwise. But the certainty
obtained in this way is of the same type, and rests upon the
same basis, as that gained through the mind's application of any
of its concepts to the concrete data of experience. For all cer-
tainty in empirical knowledge rests upon the mind's ability to
formulate definitions of concepts and to make those definitions
hold with respect to the given by rejecting all cases which do
not conform to the demands established in those definitions.
The application of mathematical concepts in the interpretation
of the given can, therefore, like the application of any other
type of concepts, never be more than hypothetical. And the
certainty derived from their application is of the same type as
that derived from the application of other types of concepts.
Also the a priori character of mathematical concepts is of the
same nature as that of any other type of concepts. Whatever
superiority they may have over the ordinary classifi.catory con-
cept is due to properties which they possess other than their a
priori character.
The a priori is not some inherent character of logical necessity
or "logical priority to the possibility of experience" possessed by
any relation or group of relations. Those initial principles and
definitive criteria which have the character of a priori necessity
and certainty possess it by virtue of the definitive attitude which
the mind takes toward them and the alternative which the mind
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 179
has of excluding from classification under them any given case
which fails to conform to the definitive attitude formulated in
them. The chemist, for instance, may know with absolute
certainty the truth of the chemical formula HC1 + NaOH ->
NaCl + H 2 Oj but only on the grounds that in the case of any
experiment in which these results fail to follow, the chemicals
used were either not HC1 or not NaOH or were neither HC1
nor NaOH. In such a case he may demand either a re-labeling
or a re-filling of the containers from which the chemicals were
obtained. On this same basis, one may assert with absolute
certainty that all crows are black. This statement may be ac-
cepted as a mere hypothetical principle, susceptible to verifica-
tion or refutation by future experience, or it may be taken as a
definitive principle and, in that case, it would not be susceptible
to refutation at all. It would be an a priori principle. The dif-
ference between the two cases is simply a difference in the
attitude which the mind takes with respect to the principle. It
is just such a definitive attitude of the mind that establishes the
a priori character of any principle, not excepting space, time,
number, magnitude, permanence, change, causality, reciprocal
interaction, or any other relation.
The assertion that this particular set of "universal functions,"
or any other particular set of relations or presuppositions "form
a fixed system 5 and only relative to this system do assertions
concerning the object, as well as concerning the subject, gain
any intelligible meaning" is an assertion which is not only un-
warranted but definitely untenable in the light of recent de-
velopments in logic and mathematics. These developments have
definitely shown that various sets of postulates may serve as a
logical basis from which the same deductive system may be de-
rived. They have also definitely shown that deductive systems
are purely analytical and tautological and that there are no
synthetic propositions a priori. As Reichenbach has correctly
said, "The evolution of science in the last century may be re-
garded as a continuous process of distintegration of the Kantian
synthetic a priori" In the light of the combined results of the
developments in science, mathematics, and logic during the last
* Hans Reichenbach, "Logistic Empiricism in Germany," Journal of Philosophy ',
vol. 33 (1936)1 H5-
i8o I. K. STEPHENS
century, it would be difficult, at least, to justify the claim that
any one set of postulates is the only one relative to which ex-
perience would be possible} or that any one set of presupposi-
tions is the only one in terms of which valid judgments con-
cerning the object or the subject of knowledge can have any
meaning. It must be admitted that some set of logically prior
principles is necessary for the possibility of any knowledge of
anything at all. But this logical priority is not the inherent
birthright of any particular set of principles. If there has ever
been any justification for the Rationalist's claim that any certain
set of "first principles" is logically indispensable for the ex-
planation of the experienced world of particulars, and that such
logical priority is a guarantee for the truth of those principles,
the grounds for that justification have been definitely elimi-
nated by the revelations of modern logic and mathematics rela-
tive to the nature of deductive systems.
It is true, of course, that all knowledge is purely relational
and that man's whole categorial and conceptual scheme is a
purely relational scheme. It is also true that such a relational
scheme has meaning only within a more or less definitely fixed
set of "reference objects" which constitute a general "frame of
reference" somewhat analogous to a set of co-ordinate axes,
the points of the compass, meridians of longitudes and parallels
of latitude, etc. Those relations which Cassirer designates as the
"fixed system" of "supreme principles" may be regarded, in the
main, as just such a system of reference objects, and as consti-
tuting such a "frame of reference." But such reference objects
are neither true nor false, neither right nor wrong. They are
only methodological devices which render possible the achieve-
ment of some desired end. They may be convenient or incon-
venient, adequate or inadequate, for the accomplishment of this
end. And although some such set of "reference objects" is neces-
sary for the accomplishment of this end, no particular set is
necessarily invariant. Nor is any particular set of such relations
indispensable.
It is true, of course, that no given datum of experience ever
comes with its meaning attached, so that it may be read off by
the mind in some sort of mtellectuelle Anschauung or some
DOCTRINE OF THE A PRIORI 181
Wordsworthian state of "wise passiveness." Each given datum
receives meaning only through some interpretive construction
being put upon it. And interpretation always involves the ap-
plication of some set of distinguishing and definitive criteria and
interpretive principles, some set of "reference objects," in terms
of which interpretation gives meaning to the given datum of
experience. Some such set of "elements of form" must, there-
fore, be logically prior to any knowledge at all. Such elements
are creations of the mind and are a priori. Even the most primi-
tive judgment involves the implicit application of such elements
to the object of the judgment. This certainly does not imply,
however, that any particular set of such a 'priori elements can be
legitimately singled out and designated as the only set in terms
of which even a meaningful experience is possible.
If one desires, therefore, to seek for the a priori either in the
intellectual creations of the childhood of the individual or in
those of the childhood of the race, he will likely find it there.
For the a priori always serves as a means for the conceptual
handling of "matters of fact," and wherever man is engaged in
this sort of enterprise he will be using it. It is also true that any
adequate conception of the a priori must be one that is applicable
anywhere, on any level and in any phase of human experience
where the work of an interpretive mind is recognizable. On this
ground, there is certainly justification for Cassirer's insistence
that certain a priori "elements of f orm" may be found on every
level and in every phase of human experience. But I see no
justification for his extension of the Critique of Reason into a
Critique of Culture for the purpose of discovering the nature of
the a priori. If his purpose was to show that the a priori consists
of a set of invariant principles, then it seems to me that his mon-
umental efforts have turned out to be a case of "Love's Labor's
Lost."
I. K. STEPHENS
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY
4
Felix Kaufmann
CASSIRER'S THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC
KNOWLEDGE
CASSIRER'S THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC
KNOWLEDGE
I
FUTURE writers of textbooks on the history of philosophy
will have little difficulty in assigning Ernst Cassirer a place
within their neat schemes of philosophical doctrines. He will be
classified as a neo-Kantian, and, more specifically, as an out-
standing member of the Marburg school of neo-Kantians,
alongside of Hermann Cohen and Paul Natorp. Cassirer him-
self frequently professed his close affiliation with this group of
thinkers 1 and was profoundly influenced by Cohen's interpreta-
tion of Kant's philosophy.
It is one of Cohen's lasting accomplishments to have shown
that Kant's intuitionistic theory of mathematics, as exhibited in
some of the arguments in his Transcendental Aesthetics, repre-
sents only a transitory, pre-critical, stage in his philosophical
development, which led to the transcendental method in the
strict sense. This can be seen from Kant's diary, as well as from
a comparison of the first edition of the Critique of Pure Reason,
with the Prolegomena and with the second edition of the Crit-
ique. Cohen submits that this trend in Kant's thought represents
genuine philosophical progress, the full implications of which
were grasped neither by Kant himself nor by the idealistic
schools which emerged after him. Accordingly, he assigns the
task to his own generation of philosophers of understanding
Kant better than he understood himself, 2 just as Kant had de-
manded that we understand Plato better than he understood
*See e.g., Cassirer's Preface to Determinismus und Indeterminismus in der
modemen Physik t viii.
2 See Preface to the ist ed. of Hermann Cohen's Logik der Reinen Erkenntnis,
xi, xii.
185
1 86 FELIX KAUFMANN
himself. A substantial part of Cassirer's life-work is an execution
of this program. It will, therefore, be appropriate to start our
analysis of his theory of knowledge with a brief outline of his
interpretation of Kant's epistemological doctrine.
II
In a famous passage of the preface to the second edition of the
Critique of Pure Reason Kant has drawn an analogy between
his work and the work of Copernicus.
The experiment . . . ought to be made, whether we should not succeed
better with the problems of metaphysic, by assuming that the objects
must conform to our mode of cognition, for this would better agree with
the demanded possibility of a priori knowledge of them, which is to
settle something about objects, before they are given us. We have here
the same case as with the first thought of Copernicus who, not being
able to get on in the explanation of the movements of the heavenly
bodies, as long as he assumed that all the stars turned round the spectator,
tried, whether he could not succeed better, by assuming the spectator
to be turning round, and the stars to be at rest. (F. Max Miiller trans-
lation [1896:1922], 693.)
This analogy suggested the facile interpretation of Kant's
philosophy, of his "Copernican Revolution," as a subjectivistic,
anthropocentric doctrine. But more penetrating students of
Kant as were the members of the Marburg school realized
that this interpretation is apt to conceal the core of Kant's trans-
cendental method. They realized that his approach was far more
"revolutionary." He did not try to offer a new solution to the
time-honored problem of the origin of knowledge by proposing
a transformation which makes the subject the initial system, the
"center of the universe." Kant rather disposed of the whole
problem in its traditional formulation by refuting all attempts
toward explaining pre-scientific and scientific experience in
terms of the dogmatic assumption of things-in-themselves. This
point is emphasized by Cassirer time and again, perhaps most
forcefully in his analysis of Kant's philosophy in the eighth
book of the Erkenntnisproblem.
Kantian philosophy is not primarily concerned with the ego, nor with
its relations to external objects, but with the principles and the logical
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 187
structure of experience. Neither "internal" nor "external" objects exist
in- and for- themselves j they are given under the conditions of experi-
ence. Accordingly, we have to develop the norms and rules of experi-
ence before we make statements about the nature of things. Hitherto
things and the ego had to be projected on a metaphysical background,
to be derived from a common substantial origin in order to be grasped
in their context; but now the question takes a new turn. What is now
sought is the fundamental logical form of experience as such, which
must apply to "internal" as well as "external" experience. Knowledge
with respect to objects cannot be entirely different from knowledge
with respect to our ego; both kinds of knowledge should be united by
an all-embracing principle. In this principle we have the genuine, true
unity of "origin," and we need only go back to this unity to dispose of
the "absolute contrasts" presupposed by traditional ontology. These
observations amount to a clear delineation of Kant's method; judgments
about things rather than things are its theme. A problem of logic is
posed, but this logical problem is exclusively related to and aimed at
that peculiar and specific form of judgment by which we claim to know
empirical objects. 8
Kant's transcendental method starts from the fact of (scien-
tific) experience and seeks to determine how this fact is possible.
In other words, he clarifies the meaning of "objective experi-
ence." In making explicit the elements of experience and the
different types and levels of synthesis involved, we arrive at
synthetic propositions a priori. These propositions are a priori
for experience inasmuch as they contain constitutive principles
of experience, but they are not independent of experience in the
sense of being valid beyond the realm of (possible) experience.
The time-honored ontological principles are found to be
pseudo-principles and the related ontological problems to be
pseudo-problems, as soon as it is recognized that the "transcend-
ent use" of the categories implied in their formulations is ille-
gitimate. Yet this "extermination" of ontological principles does
not amount to their complete annihilation} they are re-
interpreted as regulative principles of scientific inquiry.
The unity of empirical knowledge is not "given" (gegeberi)
but "set as a task" (auj 'gegeberi) ; in other words, it is not pre-
established by things-in-themselves, but conceived as an ideal,
* Erkenntnisfroblem, Vol. II, 662 f. Cf. also Vol. Ill, 3 ff.
1 88 FELIX KAUFMANN
a guiding principle, for scientific inquiry. Critical philosophy
seeks to grasp the nature of this unity by analyzing it into its
elements and determining the place of each element within the
whole, in teleological terms, by determining its function in the
constitution of the whole.
Ill
In referring to Ms meaning of the term "function" in Cas-
sirer's philosophy, we are led to another strong influence in
shaping his thought, the influence of Hegel. Broadly speaking
and making allowance for the unavoidable inaccuracy of such
a formula we may say that Cassirer used a somewhat modified
Kantian method in promoting a goal set by HegeL Although he
is well aware of the basic defects of HegePs metaphysical
system, 4 he accepts as leitmotif of his own analysis HegePs
principle that truth as the "whole" is not given all at once but
must be progressively unfolded by thought in its movement.
The unity of knowledge must be discovered in the progress of
knowledge from its primary and primitive stages to "pure"
knowledge; it reveals itself in the form of this process. None
of the phases of this process must be disregarded if we are to
grasp the form of the process. 5
Accordingly, Cassirer sets himself the task of determining
what particular type of unity is sought and (temporarily) found
in the different domains and at the different stages of human
thought, and he seeks to disclose how the transition from one
stage to another is necessitated by the inner dialetic of the move-
ment of thought.
In his first systematic work, Substanzbegriff und Funktions-
begn-jfy Cassirer was guided by the idea that the structure and
basic principles of knowledge could be most clearly discerned in
mathematics and mathematical physics, where knowledge had
reached its highest level. His chief aim was to corroborate his
thesis that the progressive emancipation of thought from the
so-called data of immediate experience manifests itself in the
development of these sciences. This process of emancipation,
4 See Erkenntnis'problem, Vol. Ill, 362-377.
9 See e.g., Preface to Vol. Ill of Philosophic der symbolischen Formen, vi fl.
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 189
which can never be completed, is most conspicuous in the re-
placement of the thing-concept by the concept of law. Even the
thing-concept is an intellectual construct of a highly complex
structure, yet it shows a close affinity to the (allegedly) pure
data of immediate perceptual experience. As long as it is made
not only the starting-point but also the pivot of philosophical
analysis, a certain kind of interpretation of mental activity in
general and of the formation of scientific concepts in particular
is suggested, an interpretation which has, indeed, prevailed in
philosophical thought from the very outset. According to this
view the activity of the mind consists exclusively in determining
and isolating common qualitative elements within the vast
variety of existing things, uniting them into classes, and repeat-
ing this procedure as long as possible. By comparing and dis-
tinguishing actually present objects of thought mathematical
objects as well as empirical objects we arrive at an ever more
embracing hierarchy of beings. The proposed interpretation
seems to be in harmony with common sense and to save us from
a dualism between percept and concept. The universals are
taken to be "in re" to be part of the perceptible world.
However, this traditional view does not bear closer exami-
nation. In the first place, it fails to account for the fact that
scientific (and even pre-scientific) concepts are not random ag-
gregates of qualities, but are established with a purpose. We do
not as Lotze remarked form a class of reddish, juicy, edible
things, under which cherries and meat might be subsumed 5 and
the reason why we don't do it is that we consider such a notion
quite irrelevant for theoretical as well as practical ends. Ref-
erence to it is not supposed to be productive of any new results.
Thus we are led to the conclusion that qualitative similarity is
not the only basis in all instances for the formation of concepts.
Realizing that this process involves judgments concerning the
relevance of a concept for the promotion of given ends, we can
no longer maintain that the mental activity involved is confined
to the recognition of qualitative similarities or differences and to
selections on this basis.
But this is only half the story. It might still be suggested that
such a similarity is a necessary condition for the formation of
190 FELIX KAUFMANN
concepts. But even this view is untenable. What is required is
rather a relation in terms of which the variety of (actually or
potentially) given objects may be ordered. Such a relation does
not dispose of the qualities of the individual objects con-
cerned if it did, it would not be of any aid in investigating
specific objects ; but it replaces fixed qualities by general rules
which enable us to grasp uno actu a total series of possible,
qualitative determinations. This is of decisive theoretical and
practical import. As inquiry proceeds, thing-concepts are gradu-
ally replaced by relation-concepts, and a hierarchy of laws,
stating invariant relations in terms of mathematical functions,
occupies the place formerly held by a hierarchy of intrinsic
qualities. The transition from Aristotle's physics to Galileo's
and Newton's physics is marked by this change in the conceptual
framework of science.
Cassirer insists that there are guiding principles in arranging
perceptual material, even on the pre-scientific level, principles
which cannot be considered as inherent in the material j but this
autonomy of form, this spontaneity of the mind, becomes ever
more conspicuous and extensive as science advances. The totality
of experience as it represents itself on any given stage of
knowledge is not a mere aggregate of data of perception} it has
a complex and intricate structure which constitutes its unity.
But this coherence of the body of knowledge established at a
given time does not exhaust what we mean by "unity of science."
There is, moreover, a "dynamic unity" of scientific procedure.
The dynamic unity becomes manifest in the very process of the
reconstruction of scientific systems. Even if we change most
general principles like those of Newton's mechanics , which
we avoid as long as less incisive changes in the theory can
restore its agreement with the results of observation, we do not
alter the fundamental form of experience, nor break the con-
tinuity of inquiry. This is seen when we consider that the new
system is supposed to yield solutions of problems that emerged
within the frame of the old system, but could not be solved
there. It would indeed be impossible to demonstrate the ad-
vantage of the new system, unless there were invariant stand-
ards of comparability. These standards are the fundamental
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 191
invariants of experience; to make them explicit is the main ob-
jective of critical (transcendental) philosophy, which, accord-
ingly, may be regarded as the general theory of the invariants of
experience.
If we say that knowledge of these "logical invariants" is
knowledge a priori y this should not be taken to mean that it is
prior (in time) to experience. It only means that these "logical
invariants" are implicitly presupposed in any valid statement
about facts. That is why the notion of space, but not that of
color, is considered a priori in Kant's theory of knowledge;
space is indeed an invariant for every physical construction;
color is not.
IV
When Cassirer laid down these views in Substance and
Function and supported them by a thorough analysis of mathe-
matical and physical terms, as they emerged in the historical
development of these sciences, Einstein's Special Theory of
Relativity had only recently been developed and the General
Theory had not yet been formulated. Cassirer's analysis of
physical concepts in this work is therefore confined to classical
physics in the strict sense. But soon after the General Theory of
Relativity had been well established, Cassirer extended his
analysis to both the Special and the General Theory. 6
The geometry underlying Einstein's General Theory of
Relativity is Riemannian geometry, which is a "Non-Euclid-
ean" geometry. The Euclidean parallel postulate is replaced in
it by the postulate that no "straight line" (geodesic) can be
drawn through a given "point" which is "parallel" to a given
"straight line." Still Euclidean geometry remains applicable
in the "limiting case" of weak gravitational fields, like that of
the earth, where the "curvature of space," determined by the
strength of the gravitational field, comes close to zero. (Eu-
clidean space is then interpreted as the space of zero-curvature.)
The establishment of Einstein's theory had been considered
by empiricist philosophers as a death-blow to Kant's doctrine.
* Cf. Einstein's Theory of Relativity. (The authorized English translation of
this work from the pen of Cassirer is printed as a "Supplement" pp. 347-45 6
in the Swabeys' English rendition of Substance and Function; Open Court, 1923.)
192 FELIX KAUFMANN
They claimed that his whole system breaks down with the col-
lapse of one of its chief pillars, the aprioricity of Euclidean
geometry. Is this claim well founded?
Even when Gauss, Lobachevski, Bolyai, and Riemann first
constructed systems of non-Euclidean geometries without, how-
ever, applying them to physical science, it had been maintained
that such systems are in conflict with Kant's philosophy. Yet
this view was certainly wrong. What had been demonstrated by
the non-Euclidean geometries provided it could be shown
that they were free from contradictions was only that the
Euclidean postulate is not an analytical consequence of the
other postulates; but Kant had never maintained that a system
of geometry different from Euclidean geometry is self-contra-
dictory. Rather he had, in distinguishing the synthetic a priori
from the analytical a priori, precluded such a view.
Kant did maintain that Euclidean geometry is a priori for
physics; and this statement cannot be squared with Einstein's
General Theory of Relativity. But it is another question
whether this fact and the fact that space and time cannot be
isolated in Einstein's theory so that they apparently lose their
physical objectivity undermines the roots of Kant's doctrine.
Cassirer submits that either of these facts leaves the funda-
mentals of critical philosophy untouched. In support of this
view he offers a penetrating analysis of the meaning of "physi-
cal objectivity," which he prefaces by a declaration of the partial
independence of the epistemologist from the scientist. The
epistemologist is bound to accept scientifically established facts
and laws, and these delimit indeed his universe of discourse;
but he is not bound to accept the scientist's interpretation of
these facts and laws in general philosophical terms, such as
the term "objectivity." The main reason why the epistemologist
is not bound to accept the scientist's interpretation is that analy-
sis made by the former reaches beyond that of the scientist.
Each answer, which physics imparts concerning the character and
the peculiar nature of its fundamental concepts, assumes inevitably for
epistemology the form of a question. When, for example, Einstein gives
as the essential result of his theory that by it "the last remainder of
physical objectivity" is taken from space and time . . ., this answer of the
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 193
physicist contains for the epistemologist the precise formulation of his
real problem. What are we to understand by the physical objectivity,
which is here denied to the concepts of space and time? To the physicist
physical objectivity may appear as a fixed and sure starting-point and as
an entirely definite standard of comparison; epistemology must ask that
its meaning ... be exactly defined/
We arrive at such a definition by clarifying the function of the
notion of objectivity in physical inquiry. Similar considerations
apply to Kant's doctrine that Euclidean geometry is the one
a priori true geometry.
We are no longer concerned with what space "is" and with whether
any definite character, whether Euclidean, Lobatschefskian or Rieman-
nian, is to be ascribed to it, but rather with what use is to be made of
the different systems of geometrical presuppositions in the interpretation
of the phenomena of nature and their dependencies according to law. 8
We could say that Euclidean space was indeed a priori for
Newtonian physics, since Euclidean geometry is presupposed
in it, whereas, by this very token, Riemannian space is a priori
for the General Theory of Relativity. This interpretation seems
to be in harmony with Einstein's view, lucidly expressed in his
lecture on Geometrie umd Erfahrung?
Kant, on the other hand, held undoubtedly that Euclidean
geometry would have to underly physical science at any stage
of its development, and this view was mistaken. But to concede
this is not to admit that Einstein's General Theory has refuted
the fundamentals of Kant's transcendental method. This method
can be upheld after it has been freed from some time-bound
limitations.
Commenting upon Cassirer's argument I would suggest that
aprioricity in a more incisive sense could be claimed for some
topological properties of space. Hermann Weyl has made the
point (in his remarkable Philosophie der Mathematik und
Naturwissenschajt [Munchen, 1927], 97) that the number
four of the dimensions of the space-time continuum is a priori
7 Einstein* 's Theory of Relativity, (Swabey tr.) 356.
8 /^.,439.
'Berlin, (1921.)
194 FELIX KAUFMANN
in Kant's sense. This would imply, it seems to me, that the
four-dimensionality of space-time is implicitly presupposed in
perceptual experience perceptual experiences being located in
four-dimensional space-time so that it could never be refuted
by perceptual experience. This interpretation is in harmony
with Kant's general conception of synthetic a priori as per-
taining to the form of experience; and it is, moreover, sup-
ported by modern psychological analysis of the structure of
perception.
When Einstein's Special and General Theories had been
firmly established, they were first regarded as a revolution in
physics, rendering the fundamental notions and principles of
classical physics obsolete. But Einstein himself has always
stressed the continuity of the process of inquiry leading to this
theory; and nowadays his theory is considered the perfection
of classical physics rather than its destruction. But the second
great event in twentieth century physics, the emergence of
quantum physics, is taken to be more truly revolutionary, and
to impose on us a revision not only of fundamental physical
notions, but also of philosophical categories, particularly of the
category of causality. Here, then, seems to exist an even deeper
cleavage between the Kantian theory for which Newton's
magnum of us represented the "fact of science" and a theory
of knowledge which is in conformity with modern physics.
But even in this case we are cautioned by Cassirer against
assuming that the transcendental method has been rendered
obsolete by recent developments in physics. He discusses quan-
tum physics in his Determinisnws und Indeterminismus in der
modernen Physik a work which offers perhaps the most
accomplished elaboration of his theory of science. It is essential
for the transcendental method, Cassirer points out, that it deals
not directly with things but rather with our empirical knowl-
edge of things, more precisely with the form of experience.
Kant agrees with Hume's critique of the notion of causality
10 Determinismus und Indeterminismus in der modernen Physik. (Sub-title:
Historische und systematische Studien zum Kausalproblem.) Goteburg (1936).
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 195
inasmuch as it established that there is no innate, self-evident
idea of causality, no subjective necessity rooted in our mental
organization which compels us to acknowledge a rigid causal
nexus among phenomena. But Kant's epistemological analysis
does not stop at this point, as did Hume's. Whereas he admits
that the principle of causality does not enable us to state any
specific physical law, he vindicates this principle as a "postulate,"
as a "regulative principle" of science. It is a statement of the
resolution not to give up the search for causes and to strive to-
ward an ever more comprehensive system of knowledge, a
resolution which is basic for scientific inquiry.
Cassirer is, of course, fully aware of the fact that Kant had
not been quite consistent in the development of this idea, that
he had, in the "Analogies of Experience," offered a "deduc-
tion" of the principle of causality. But this, Cassirer declares, is
one more point where we have to understand Kant better than
he understood himself, if we are to be true Kantians. We have
to follow him only so long as he does not part with his own
professed principles, the principles of the transcendental
method.
The preceding remarks should not create the impression
that Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics is pri-
marily concerned with a defense of Kant's transcendental
method. This is by no means the case. The object of this book
is rather a reconsideration of the structure of physical science
in the light of the development of quantum physics. One of
Cassirer's most important points is the distinction between
three types of statements in physics, viz., a) statements of the
results of measurements (Massaussagen), b) laws, c) prin-
ciples. This distinction was suggested by Russell's theory of
types which had been established for the purpose of pre-
cluding the emergence of antinomies in logic and Cantorian set
theory. The theory of types is governed by the so-called Vicious
Circle Principle: "Whatever includes all of a collection must
not be one of the collection," which "enables us to avoid the
vicious circles involved in the assumption of illegitimate totali-
ties." 11 Cassirer's hierarchy of types of physical statements is
u Whitehead-Russell, Prmcipia Mathematka, Vol. I, 40.
196 FELIX KAUFMANN
meant to preclude similar predicaments in the analysis of em-
pirical science.
Concerning (a): Statements of the results of measurement
are attained by transposing reports of sensory experiences into
determinations in terms of numerical relations. These "state-
ments of the first order" are singular propositions. They relate
to definite space-time points.
Concerning (b) : Realization that physical laws are a distinct
type of physical statements implies rejection of the sensation-
alists' view most vigorously defended by J. S. Mill that a
physical law is but an aggregate of particular truths, and that
"all inference is from particulars to particulars." This view has
always been one of the chief targets of Cassirer's criticism. Time
and again he has pointed out that it is not in accordance with
actual scientific procedure and that the great scientists of the
modern age, from Galileo on, were fully aware of the hetero-
geneity of fact-statements and laws. A law is a hypothetical
judgment of the form: "If x then y;" it does not connect single
magnitudes with definite space-time points; rather it refers
to classes of magnitudes, classes which have an infinite number
of elements and are thus inexhaustible by simple enumera-
tion. 12
Concerning (c) : The distinction between fact-statements and
laws had been widely recognized before; but the difference be-
tween laws and principles had remained almost unnoticed.
Whereas facts are brought into a definite order by laws, the
laws themselves are integrated into a higher unity by principles,
such as the principle of the conservation of energy or the prin-
ciple of least action (which is the most general of all physical
principles).
The three types of statements may be differentiated in a
formal way by calling them, respectively, "individual," "gen-
eral," and "universal."
In defending the tripartition against the tendencies (repre-
sented by Mill) toward levelling down these distinctions, Cas-
sirer makes an interesting remark which indicates his attitude
M Determinismus . . ., 5 iff.
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 197
toward "dogmatic empiricism." "The defect of dogmatic em-
piricism," he points out,
does not consist in its attempt to link all knowledge to experience and
to recognize nothing but experience as a criterion of truth, but rather in
its failure to go far enough in the analysis of experience, in its stopping
short of a clarified notion of it. It is not infrequently a vague assumption
of continuity that leads to this attitude; empiricism refrains from strictly
separating the various stages of knowledge in order to be able to develop
them from each other. But this development is deceptive, if one seeks to
understand it as a mere reproduction of similarity. Somewhere in the
process of knowledge we must acknowledge a genuine "mutation"
which leads to something new and independent. 13
The failure of dogmatic empiricism to give a proper account
of the practice of physical inquiry becomes most obvious in an
analysis of statistical laws which latter have gained an ever
higher significance since Gibbs' and Boltzmann's foundation
of statistical mechanics. Boltzmann's kinetical theory of gases
interprets the physical properties of a gas, such as its density, its
pressure, its specific heat, as resultants of the movements of its
molecules} but it does not attempt to determine the move-
ments of each single molecule. Some hypothetical assumptions
concerning statistical averages, for instance average velocity, are
made, and the behavior of the gas is explained in terms of
these hypotheses. It is clear that such a procedure cannot be
interpreted as an inference from particulars to particulars, as
Mill and his disciples would have it.
There is one more methodological conclusion which we may
draw from Boltzmann's theory, a conclusion which provides a
cue to the philosophical interpretation of quantum physics,
namely that physics does not attempt to answer every "Why-
question" 14 which may possibly be asked, and that its success is
largely due to this self-restraint, and to a selection of problems
in accordance with certain regulative principles of inquiry.
Having realized this, we shall no longer maintain that Hei-
senberg's principle of indeterminacy, which occupies a central
"Ibid., 132.
198 FELIX KAUFMANN
place in quantum physics, means a complete break with the
fundamental ideas of classical physics. Heisenberg's principle
states that the precision in determining simultaneously two
"conjugate magnitudes," such as the position and the velocity of
an electron, is limited by Planck's constant h. In the older (un-
critical) view, which interpreted electrons as "material points,"
pre-established thing-like entities, this principle seemed to in-
volve sceptical resignation, the acknowledgment that the finite
human mind cannot trespass certain boundaries. Critical analysis,
however, reveals that the traditional formulation of these
"insoluble problems" is inadequate, and that the pertinent
arguments of the sceptics lose their point as soon as we formu-
late the problems adequately. We have to dispose of the idea
that a material point is a pre-established entity, existing inde-
pendently of the relations into which it may enter, and to
realize that "material point" is defined in terms of the system
of these relations. Cassirer points out that there is no basic
difference in this respect between the notion of a "material"
physical point and the notion of an "ideal" mathematical point.
In the so-called axioms of geometry, a mathematical point is
"implicitly defined" in terms of a system of formal relations.
"Material point," on the other hand, is implicitly defined in
terms of a system of relations which we call a physical theory.
Hence "material" points are intellectual constructs, as are
"ideal" geometrical points j and the demand that "absolute"
locations should be assigned to them is as illegitimate as would
be the corresponding demand for geometrical points.
VI
We have already mentioned that Cassirer's analysis of physi-
cal theories is performed with the purpose of corroborating his
thesis that the decisive stages in the advancement of science are
marked by a progressive emancipation from "naive" realism,
which starts from a conception of things-in-themselves and
interprets knowledge as a conformity of our thoughts with those
pre-established "objects." Each new stage in scientific progress
is characterized by a specific type of "objectification," by the
creation of new scientific objects, represented in the symbols
of the language of science. All of Cassirer's elaborate and en-
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 199
lightening interpretations of scientific theories are but so many
variations of this central theme. The same is true of his analysis
of mathematical concepts.
A substantial part of Substance and Function is devoted to this
analysis. Russell's Principles of Mathematics had, at the time,
been published only a few years before, and Whitehead-
RusselPs Principa Mathematica had not yet appeared. The
number of mathematicians and philosophers engaged in work-
ing on problems of the "foundations of mathematics" was still
small. This situation changed rapidly during the following two
decades. Principa Mathematica demonstrated what can be
achieved in the way of a unification of logic and mathematics j
Hilbert took the final step in the "formalization" of mathe-
matics, and Brouwer advanced his criticism of the application
of the principle of excluded middle, a criticism which seemed to
affect not only Cantor's set theory, but large sections of classical
mathematics. Spirited controversies between logicists (Russell),
formalists (Hilbert), and intuitionists (Brouwer) ensued and
attracted wide attention j and it was generally assumed that basic
philosophical issues were at stake. However, there were only a
small number of philosophers who were prepared to face the
difficulties in studying the rather "technical" books and papers
in the field.
Cassirer was one of those few. In chapter IV of Part III of
the third volume of his Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen
(1929) he offers a well-considered interpretation of some of
the major pertinent problems, an accomplishment which de-
served more attention than it has actually received. Philosophers
should be grateful to him for his placing these problems in
their proper historical setting. And they should, moreover, find
some of his critical remarks apt and incisive. I, for one, have
no doubt that he is right in rejecting i) Russell's reduction of
the number concept to the class concept, 2) Brouwer's (and
Becker's) interpretation of the role of time in mathematics,
and 3) Hilbert's philosophical interpretation of his formaliza-
tion of mathematics, according to which the visible marks as
such would be the object of mathematics. 15 Each of these points
18 The present writer came to similar conclusions, in a book, Das Unendliche in
200 FELIX KAUFMANN
is of major philosophical significance. Russell's way of relating
the class concept to the number concept is closely linked with
his sensationalist and nominalist view concerning universals.
Brouwer's emphasis on the time factor in mathematics (and his
demand for actual construction in mathematics) raises the basic
issue of the meaning of possibility (which is indeed the prob-
lem of universals seen from another angle). And Hilbert's
interpretation of his formalization involves the same problem.
Cassirer never tires of stressing that we have to interpret
"reality" and "experience" in terms of "possibility", though
there is no "realm of possibilities" beyond experience. He
analyzes mathematical systems, for instance those of different
types of geometry, in order to make it clear that they do not
contain any assertions about "real" things or facts, but deal with
pure possibilities. These possibilities cannot be derived from
sense perception. "Experience as such does not contain in itself
a principle for the production of such possibilities, its role is
confined to a selection among them in the application to given
concrete cases. Its real accomplishment consists in determina-
tion rather than in constitution." 16 "One could say, using a
metaphor taken from the language of chemistry, that sense
experience has essentially a 'catalytic' function in the develop-
ment of the theories of the natural sciences." 17 Sense experience
is indispensable for the process of forming exact concepts, but it
is no longer contained as an independent ingredient in the
product emerging from this process, in the scientific concept.
And the process of establishing scientific concepts, which is a
process of objectification, has its own immanent principle of
development. Each subsequent (higher) stage of development
terminates the earlier stage, but it assimilates rather than ex-
terminates that earlier stage. 18 A striking example is the prog-
ress from Newton's system to Einstein's Special Theory and
General Theory of Relativity.
der Mathematik und seine Ausschaltung, which appeared shortly after the publica-
tion of Cassirer's work.
* Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen, Vol. Ill, 487.
"Ibid., 485.
18 Hegel expresses this view by using the word "aufgehoben," which may mean
cancelled (abrogated) or "preserved."
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 201
VII
Each stage of obj edification is represented by a specific sys-
tem of linguistic symbols. But this fact must not be interpreted
as a creation of concepts (meanings) by words, as radical nom-
inalists would have it. The meaning is the nuclear point, the
true wpd-rcpov <pucret. However we should not regard the word
as a mere appendix to the concept, it is rather one of the most
important means for the actualization of the concept, for its
separation from the "immediately given." Hence linguistic
signs are indispensable in the process of objectification,'and
it is proper to approach the theory of knowledge from the angle
of an analysis of scientific language. But in doing this we should
bear in mind that the theory of knowledge is not the whole of
philosophy, and that the activity of the scientist is not the
only nor the first attempt of man to transform a chaos
of immediate experiences into a cosmos. The symbolism of scien-
tific language is therefore not the only symbolism a study of
which is required for an understanding of the nature of man,
who should be defined as an animal symboUcum rather than as
an animal rationale
It is the task of systematic philosophy ... to grasp the whole system of
symbolic forms, the application of which produces for us the concept of
an ordered reality, and by virtue of which subject and object, ego and
world are separated and opposed to each other in definite form, and it
must refer each individual in this totality to its fixed place. If we assume
this problem solved, then the rights would be assured, and the limits
fixed, of each of the particular forms of the concept and of knowledge
as well as of the general forms of the theoretical, ethical, aesthetic and
religious understanding of the world. Each particular form would be
"relativized" with regard to the others, but since this "relativization"
is throughout reciprocal and since no single form but only the systematic
totality can serve as the expression of "truth" and "reality," the limit
that results appears as a thoroughly immanent limit, as one that is re-
moved as soon as we again relate the individual to the system of the
whole. 20
The three volumes of Cassirer's Philosophic der symbolischen
19 An Essay on Man (1944), 26.
w Einstein's Theory of Relativity, (Swabey translation), 447.
202 FELIX KAUFMANN
Formen (summarized in his Essay on Man) represent a re-
markable contribution towards this goal. The chief critical
outcome of this approach is a refutation of sensationalism as
well as of dogmatic realism. Cassirer realized that such a refuta-
tion, in order to be fully convincing, must start at the level of
sense-perception.
We shall conclude our brief outline of Cassirer's epistemology
by referring to his important study "The Concept of Group and
the Theory of Perception," 21 which suggests a mathematical
interpretation of some of the results of Gestalt psychology, and
contains a devastating criticism of the traditional sensationalist
theory of perception, according to which perception is merely
a bundle of sense-impressions.
This doctrine, Cassirer points out, has been definitely shat-
tered by physiological and psychological research initiated by
Helmholtz's and Hering's investigations. There is first of all
the established fact of perceptual constancy involving both
color constancy and constancy of spatial shape and size. A sheet
of paper which appears white in ordinary daylight is recognized
as white in very dim light as well ; a piece of velvet which looks
black to us under a cloudy sky looks also black to us in full
sunshine} a piece of paper which looks blue to us in daylight
looks blue also in the reddish-yellow light of a gasflame. Con-
sidering that every change of illumination is accompanied by
a modification in the stimulation of the retina, we realize that
these facts cannot be squared with the sensationalist's theory of
perception, which claims that the stimuli are simply "copied"
in perception. We have to admit, on the basis of this evidence,
that the stimuli are transformed in a certain direction.
Experiments concerning perceptions of shape and size lead
to similar conclusions.
When an object is moved away from our eyes, the images on the retinae
become smaller and smaller. Nonetheless, within certain distances, the
perceptual size of the object is constant. Variations of shape, which result
from the fact that a figure is turned out of the frontal-parallel position,
21 This article appeared first in French in the Journal de Psychologle (1938),
368-414. It was recently translated into English by Dr. A. Gurwitch and
published in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. V (1944-45), 1-35.
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 203
are also "counterbalanced" by the eye to a high degree, so that we
perceive the figure in its "true" shape. What is meant by this "truth"
a kind of truth which seems to contradict the objective facts, the real
conditions of physical stimulation? In raising this question, psychological
inquiry comes close to the fundamental epistemological problems of the
theory of perception, even though it may try to confine itself strictly to
empirical observation. 22
The theory of knowledge has to take account of the fact that
"we do not merely re-ac? to the stimulus, but in a certain
sense act 'against' it," and thereby accomplish a "transforma-
tion." This fact gives rise to the question whether the group
concept, the nuclear concept in the mathematical theory of
transformations, can offer a clue for an interpretation of the
phenomena of perception.
Group theory, which has developed in the last hundred years
into one of the most important mathematical disciplines, has
also substantially contributed to a deeper understanding of the
nature of mathematics, and particularly of geometry. A group
(as defined by Lie and Klein) is a system of unique operations
A, B, C, . . . so that from the combination of any two operations
A and B there results an operation C which also belongs to the
totality: A B = C. The system must contain the Identity
Element which, when combined with any other element, leaves
this other element unchanged. Furthermore, there must be an
inverse operation S" 1 established for any given operation S,
such that S" 1 cancels out (reverses) Sj and finally, the associa-
tive law A (BC) = (AB) C must hold. Now it has been defi-
nitely established in F. Klein's famous "Erlanger Program of
1872" that the geometrical properties of any figures are com-
pletely describable in terms of group theory. Our familiar
metrical Euclidean geometry is a member of a family of geom-
etries, each of which investigates the invariant properties
of a particular group. The groups may be classified in an order
of increasing generality. We arrive from metrical geometry
successively at affinitive geometry, projective geometry, and
topology (analysis situs} by considering movements with re-
204 FELIX KAUFMANN
spect to ever wider "principal groups of transformations." With
every extension of the "principal group" some distinctions
which could be made in a geometry corresponding to the nar-
rower principal group disappear. Thus the distinction between
circles and ellipses disappears in affinitive geometry} all kinds
of conic sections (circles, ellipses, hyperbolae, parabolae) be-
come indistinguishable in projective geometry, and as we come
to topology we can no longer differentiate between any figures
that may be derived from each other by continuous reversibly
unique distortions.
Helmholtz was the first to attempt an application of group
theory to an investigation of the phenomena of perception.
But this approach could not stand up under experimental tests.
Since that time the psychology of perception has made great
strides, particularly through the work of the Gestalt psycholo-
gists (Wertheimer, Kohler, Koffka, Katz, and many others)
who followed a trend of thought suggested by Ehrenfels.
Gestalt psychologists have performed systematic studies of in-
variances of perceptual experiences with respect to certain kinds
of variations in the stimuli. It is characteristic of phenomenal
forms ($haenomenale Gestalten) that their specific properties
remain unchanged when the absolute data upon which they
rest undergo certain modifications. Thus a melody is not sub-
stantially altered when all of its notes are subjected to the
same relative displacement j an optical spatial figure remains
approximately the same when it is presented in a different place
or on a different scale, but in the same proportions. 23
These phenomena, Cassirer submits, are closely related to
group theory.
What we find in both cases are invariances with respect to variations
undergone by the primitive elements out of which a form is constructed.
The peculiar kind of "identity" that is attributed to apparently altogether
heterogeneous figures in virtue of their being transformable into one
another by means of certain operations defining a group, is thus seen
to exist also in the domain of perception. This identity permits us not only
to single out elements, but also to grasp "structures" in perception. To
28 W. Kohler, Die fhysischen Gestalten in Ruhe ttnd im stationary Zustand,
(1920), 37, quoted by Cassirer in Ibid., 25.
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 205
the mathematical concept of "transformability" there corresponds, in the
domain of perception, the concept of "transposability." 24
However, we must not interpret this correspondence as an
identity. There is no complete invariance of phenomena of
perception with respect to such variations as mentioned above.
Gestalt psychologists have fully recognized that we should
speak of more or less effective tendencies toward invariance, the
degree of effectiveness depending on various factors of which
we have to take account in describing a perceptual field. Wert-
heimer has, accordingly, introduced the concept of "Gestalt
dispositions," by which he understands tendencies toward "laws
of organization" of the perceptual material.
It could not escape Cassirer's attention that these results of
modern psychology square well with Plato's conception of the
relation between perception and thought. Moreover, he em-
phasized that they vindicate some basic ideas of Kant's concern-
ing the function of imagination which Kant had laid down in
the Critique of Pure Reason (chapter on Schematism) and in
the Critique of Judgment. But the most obvious philosophical
conclusions to be drawn from these psychological results is
the untenability of the sensationalist's interpretation of percep-
tion as a process of mere reproduction. Considering that this
interpretation is at the very heart of the sensationalist doctrine,
it is difficult to understand how this doctrine should be able
to continue to have any influence after its lifeline has been cut.
VIII
Brief and fragmentary as our presentation of Cassirer's con-
tributions to the theory of knowledge had to be, it has, I hope,
brought into sharp focus the guiding principles of his analysis
of cognition. This should enable us to determine in a broad way
the relation of his teachings to other contemporary philosophi-
cal doctrines.
Although he is inclined to stress points of agreement rather
than points of disagreement, and generously acknowledges
merits even where he disapproves, Cassirer makes it unmistak-
ably clear that he is strongly opposed to uncritical realism and
25.
206 FELIX KAUFMANN
sensationalism. Moreover, he rejects all varieties of transem-
pirical metaphysics j philosophy is, to him, as it was to Kant,
analysis of experience. He combats "atomism" wherever he
finds it and endorses a coherence theory of truth which bears
some resemblance to HegePs pertinent views ; but he would
not accept the chief tenets of the doctrines of Bradley and
other neo-Hegelians, who claim that the real subject of a
judgment is the Absolute, and that our particular judgments
are inconsistent.
Can it then be said that Cassirer is a "positivist" who dis-
poses of metaphysical sentences as meaningless pseudo-state-
ments? We should hardly expect a historian of philosophy, who
has taken so much pains in interpreting the teachings of the
great "metaphysicians" of the past, to endorse this view without
qualifications. Although he concedes that metaphysical sentences
are not meaningful at face value, he insists that they can be
transformed into meaningful sentences by interpreting onto-
logical principles as regulative principles of cognition. "What
metaphysics ascribes as a 'property to things in themselves now
proves to be a necessary element in the process of obj edifica-
tion." 25 This way of dealing with metaphysical doctrines had
been established in Kant's "Transcendental Dialectics," and the
philosophers of the Marburg school have consistently followed
this clue. It would be a good thing for the more uncompromis-
ing anti-metaphysicians to give this Kantian and neo-Kantian
approach a second thought. Desirable as it is to get rid of
pseudo-problems, we should, in disposing of them, be careful
lest we pour out the baby with the bath.
Cassirer took issue with this cavalier way of treating meta-
physical doctrines in one of his later works. 26 There he quotes
with approval a statement made half a century ago by the
great physicist Heinrich Hertz, which was aimed at the anti-
metaphysicians among his fellow-scientists. "No consideration
which makes any impression on our mind can be disposed of by
labeling it as 'metaphysical j' every thinking mind has needs
88 Substance and Function. 303^
26 Axel Hagerstrom: Eine Studie zur schwedischen Philosofhie der Gegenwart
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 207
which the natural scientist is wont to call 'metaphysical'."
Heinrich Hertz was anything but a metaphysician j his great
work, Die Prinzfyien der Mechanik, from which the sentence
quoted above is taken, has indeed more definitely disposed of
the "metaphysical" concept of force than any preceding treatise
on physics. But he realized that the attempts of scientists to-
wards making their fundamental notions clear frequently stop
short of the level of clarity that can be reached if clarification
of meaning is made the primary objective of inquiry. That's
where the philosopher steps in, but in doing this he has to be
constantly on his guard against hasty interpretations of scien-
tific findings which seem to lend support to his specific doctrine.
It is shown by the record that scientists who become philoso-
phers in their leisure hours are hardly less exposed to this
danger than professional philosophers, though in a slightly
different form. Whereas their accounts of the work accomp-
lished in their own field are usually accurate, they are prone
to exaggerate the range of applicability of their methods to
other domains of inquiry and, consequently, to underrate the
significance of other methods. But we should gratefully ac-
knowledge the fact that a number of prominent scientists like
Helmholtz, Mach, and Poincare who discussed the "founda-
tions" of their sciences, have offered most valuable aid to phi-
losophers in their attempts to grasp thoroughly the methods of
science. Ernst Cassirer used this help to the best advantage.
There is one more point to be made in this context. The fact
that the process of clarification is carried farther by philosophers
than by scientists, qua scientists, may be stressed by saying that
philosophical analysis penetrates deeper than scientific analysis.
Understood in this sense, the statement is legitimate. But it
should not be taken to imply that the "realm" of scientific
knowledge is strictly separated from the "deeper realm" of
philosophical knowledge, and that the scientist qua scientist and
the philosopher qua philosopher have to refrain from crossing
the borderlines. This view, which may be historically linked to
the medieval doctrine of the twofold truth, has been defended
more or less explicitly by prominent contemporary philoso-
phers and scientists, such as Whitehead, Eddington, and Jeans,
208 FELIX KAUFMANN
but it is certainly not endorsed by Cassirer. He holds that the
scientist can in principle never go too far in the process of
clarification of his terms and methods, and that the philosophers
can never come too close to the scientist's work.
Cassirer's "scientific attitude" and his familiarity with mod-
ern mathematics and physics represents no minor link between
his teaching and the doctrine of logical positivism, which has
so emphatically stressed this attitude and so thoroughly ana-
lyzed the principles of mathematics and natural science. 27 This
affinity became even greater as logical positivism gradually
freed itself from vestiges of sensationalism, which were largely
due to the influence of Mach and Russell. But there are im-
portant doctrinal differences which should not be overlooked.
The logical positivists are radical anti-metaphysicians in the
sense described above. They regard ontological statements as
altogether meaningless and seek to eliminate them by a logical
analysis of language} whereas Cassirer transforms them into
regulative principles of inquiry. Another point of difference is
Cassirer's rejection of "physicalism," (radical behaviorism),
which has for some time prevailed among logical positivists.
But it should be noted that the leading philosopher of the
group, Rudolf Carnap, has, in the last decade, modified his
physicalistn to an extent which comes close to its complete
abandonment. 28
There is, moreover, the issue of the universals which divides
the two doctrines. Cassirer is clearly opposed to nominalism,
whereas the logical positivists are among the staunchest nomi-
nalists in contemporary philosophy. Cassirer's "conceptualistic"
view is well expressed in the following sentence: 29
That the general birch-tree "exists" can only mean that what is to be
27 Philipp Frank, one of the leading members of this group, is basically in
agreement with Cassirer's interpretation of quantum physics and considers his
philosophical work as a whole as a (highly welcome) symptom of a "disintegrating
process inside of school philosophy." See his discussion of Cassirer's Determinismus
und Indeterminismtts in der modernen Physik in his volume, Between Physics and
Philosophy (Cambridge, 194.1), 191-210.
88 1 have discussed this change in Carnap's view in Ch. XI of my Methodology
of the Social Sciences, New York, (i 944) .
* Axel Hagerstrb'm, 5 1 .
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 209
stated by it is not a mere name, not simply a flatus vocis; the statement
is meant to refer to relations of the real. We express by the notion
"general birch-tree" merely the fact that there are judgments which do
not refer to this or that here and now given birch-tree, but claim to
apply to "all" birch-trees. I can uphold this logical participation, this
[XTet of the particular in the general, without transforming it into an
ontological statement in which two fundamental forms of reality are
posited.
In the paper mentioned above, Philipp Frank quotes Jacques
Maritain as saying "that the aim of the Vienna circle and of the
whole movement of logical empiricism was to 'disontologize
science'." 30 We might say with equal right that one of the aims
of Cassirer's theory of knowledge is to disontologize philosophy
without destroying it.
IX
The relation of Cassirer's philosophy to pragmatism in gen-
eral, and to Dewey's instrumentalism in particular, might, at
first glance, seem to be more remote than its relation to logical
positivism, and to imply a larger number of conflicting tenets.
But this cannot be unreservedly maintained. The neo-Kantian-
ism of the Marburg school is, indeed, in some important re-
spects closer to pragmatism than to logical positivism. We
shall confine ourselves to a brief comparison between Cassirer's
and Dewey's theories of knowledge and make the point that
some striking differences between their doctrines are less funda-
mental than one might suppose them to be. Dewey's philosophy,
it might be suggested, is through and through naturalistic;
Cassirer's philosophy, on the other hand, is through and through
idealistic. We are thus confronted with two diametrically op-
posed philosophical approaches.
But such an interpretation is all too facile, and cannot bear
closer examination. We should be aided in a more thorough
appraisal of the relation between the two philosophies by con-
sidering their historical settings. Dewey, as well as Cassirer, was
profoundly influenced (though in a different way) by Kantian
and Hegelian teachings} and both were also under the impact
90 Between Physics and Philosophy, 195.
210 FELIX KAUFMANN
of the naturalist-empiricist reaction to these teachings. Each
of the two men was too penetrating a thinker to ignore the
strong points in either of the conflicting philosophical trends.
It is, of course, undeniable that Dewey broke determinedly
away from the Hegelian tradition and rejected in unambiguous
terms Kant's apriorism and dualism (as he saw them) j whereas
Cassirer considers himself as a faithful, though not orthodox,
follower of Kant, and to some extent, even of Hegel. Quite
a number of doctrinal differences, which should by no means
be minimized, can be historically interpreted in terms of this
split. But we have to ask whether the split goes to the roots,
whether it leads to opposite theoretical or practical conclusions.
We might look for a clue to an answer to this question by
considering the manner in which our two philosophers deal
with the notions of "development" and "progress." When Cas-
sirer uses these terms, we are reminded of Aristotle's entelechy
and self-perfection, of Leibniz' monads, and of Hegel's dia-
lectical movement of the objective mind. When Dewey uses
these terms, one is under the spell of Darwin's Origin of
Species. We know that the effect of this shift in meaning from
spiritual development to biological evolution can be tremen-
dous. It is apt to lend support to a transvaluation of traditional
values and to the irrationalism of a Nietzsche, Pareto, Sorel.
But we know as well that Dewey is most vigorously opposed to
these irrationalist tendencies, and shall therefore not conclude
that an irreconcilable conflict between the two doctrines is
proved by a pragmatic test. Since we cannot thoroughly under-
stand diversities unless we are able to grasp the underlying
identities, we shall start by referring to the common features
of the two doctrines.
First of all, they are close to each other in the professed aim
of their theories of knowledge, which is to clarify the basic
principles of scientific inquiry. Consequently, they are opposed
to any interpretation of philosophy, according to which philoso-
phy could and should "legislate" to science. Moreover, they
agree that one should rather define "(factual) truth" in terms
of knowledge, as outcome of inquiry, than knowledge in terms
of "truth." Both philosophers reject the correspondence theories
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 211
of truth as proposed by realists and by sensationalists, e.g.,
Bertrand Russell. They endorse a coherence theory of truth,
where "coherence" is not understood as mere consistency of the
body of established knowledge, but interpreted in terms of the
principles of empirical procedure. Linked with this point is
the conception of inquiry as a process which is guided by a set
of "postulates." Kant's regulative principles as interpreted by
the Marburg school, are not very different in function from
Peirce's and Dewey's leading principles though the latter are
more flexible and the resemblance between Cassirer's and
Dewey's reinterpretations of traditional epistemological contro-
versies in terms of such methodological principles is sometimes
striking.
These considerations should suffice for a rejection of the
view that Cassirer's decidedly idealistic approach is diametric-
ally opposed to Dewey's decidedly naturalistic approach. As
a matter of fact, we need not go very far in the study of Dewey's
work to discover that his naturalism is heavens apart from those
crude types of naturalism which would "reduce" human ac-
tivity to behavior of inanimate bodies. I do not see why
Cassirer should have had to take issue with a naturalism which
is characterized as follows:
The term "naturalistic" has many meanings. As it is here employed
it means, on one side, that there is no breach of continuity between
operations of inquiry and biological operations and physical operations.
"Continuity," on the other side, means that rational operations grow
out of organic activities, without being identical with that from which
they emerge. 81
Nor was he bound to have any substantial objections to Dewey's
outline of the "cultural matrix of inquiry" in the third chapter
of the Logic (and in earlier works), which might well have led
to the definition of man as a symbol-making animal, as sug-
gested by Cassirer.
Yet there are indeed incisive differences between the two
doctrines which have direct bearing upon methodological is-
sues. We shall briefly examine two of them. The first relates
"Dewey, Logic: The Theory of Inquiry^ i8f.
212 FELIX KAUFMANN
to the problem of the nature of meanings. While Dewey is not
an extreme nominalist, he is much closer to nominalism than
Cassirer, even though Cassirer is as little a conceptual realist
as was Kant. 32 Dewey treats comprehension of meaning and
sensation on an almost equal footing. Immediate experience
of both types is taken to be preliminary} it indicates a problem,
but it cannot by itself establish knowledge. Only in its proper
setting within the context of empirical inquiry is such experi-
ence conducive to knowledge. Cassirer would endorse this view
as far as sensation is concerned. This tenet is indeed as essential
in his philosophy as it is in Dewey's. But he would not accept
the view that comprehension of meaning is in a similar sense
controlled by empirical inquiry as is sensation. He would,
moreover, insist upon a sharp differentiation between verifies de
raison and verites de fait, and, accordingly, upon the autonomy
of pure logic and pure mathematics.
Although I am in agreement with Cassirer on this issue, I
think that in another respect Dewey's theory of inquiry is su-
perior to Cassirer'sj namely, in its analysis of scientific testing.
One might be tempted to emphasize this point by declaring
that Cassirer's interpretation of science is static, whereas Dew-
ey's approach is dynamic. These terms are indeed suggestive of
an important difference between the two approaches, but they
should not mislead us into conceiving of Cassirer as an orthodox
disciple of Parmenides. He realizes as well as any pragmatist
that scientific inquiry is a potentially endless self-correcting
process 5 but (like the classical economist) he focuses his atten-
tion upon states of equilibrium, where the material of avail-
able perceptual experience is "absorbed" by theoretical systems.
Dewey, on the other hand, concentrates upon the processes that
emerge from (particular) states of disequilibrium indeter-
minate situations and lead to the attainment of new equilib-
ria (determinate situations). And he deals more thoroughly
with the conditions of "warranted assertability," with the criteria
for the distinction between warranted and unwarranted asser-
tions.
The analysis of warranted assertability is intimately con-
18 See $ufra, i89f, 208 f.
THEORY OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 213
nected with the problem of determining the relation between
propositional meaning and the criteria of verification of propo-
sitions (the so-called truth-conditions). Cassirer's discussion,
in his Erkenntnisproblem, of Kant's criticism of the ontological
argument gives some hints as to where he stands on this issue;
but I do not think that it suffices for a full understanding of
his position. This problem is as actual in contemporary theory
of knowledge as was the problem of the relation between essence
and existence in Greek and medieval philosophy j and I would
even submit that it is a "modern" version of this time-honored
metaphysical issue. As such it is closely linked with the peren-
nial problems of matter and form, which are a leitmotif
throughout Cassirer's work.
It would be a rewarding task to compare Cassirer's general
treatment of these problems with their treatment in HusserPs
phenomenology. But in making such an attempt I should have
to overstep the boundaries of space allotted to me and the
limits of my assignment, and I am too well aware of Heraclitus'
warning to venture this. I shall therefore confine myself to the
remark that HusserPs approach to the problems of matter and
form 33 is rather different from Cassirer's approach, which is
more in line with the classical interpretation of matter as both
a challenge and an obstacle to the 'forming' activity of the
mind.
In the General Introduction to The Library of Living Phi-
losophers y the editor resumes F. C. S. Schiller's question: "Must
philosophers disagree?" When one studies Ernst Cassirer's
work, which sheds a flood of light on different philosophical
aspects with a view towards synthesizing them, one feels that
disagreement among philosophers need not persist unabated.
FELIX KAUFMANN
GRADUATE FACULTY
NEW SCHOOL FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH
88 In the sth and 6th of his Logische Untersuchungen, in the Ideen, in Formale
und transcendental* Logik, and in Erfahrung und Urteil.
5
Dmitry Gawronsky
CASSIRER'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS
CASSIRER'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS
MO OTHER epistemological problem has caused philoso-
phers and scientists as great a headache as the application
of mathematics to the cognition of real things. Mathematics
and material things seem to belong to two quite different worlds
mathematical concepts, relations, and laws reveal such an
absolute precision and necessity, two qualities, these latter,
which do not exist in the same form in the world of reality. The
geometrical straight line, for instance, is physically a quite im-
possible concept: first, because this line consists exclusively of
one dimension and, not having any thickness, could not be
represented by any really existing thing; and, secondly, it is
conceived as a form which has absolutely no curbs or bends,
and this, again, is a physical impossibility. One could argue
that the concept of straight line is given us even if not in a
perfect, then at least in an approximative form by real things,
for instance by a straight slender stick. Yet, this argument is
hardly sound; first of all, this slender stick is not just a gift
of nature, but had been manufactured by man who was guided
in this job by his idea of a straight line; and, secondly, even if
by some miracle such a rod could be found in nature, even then
it could be transformed into an exact mathematical concept only
through an infinite process of attenuation and straightening,
whereby the straight line itself, as the limit of this infinite proc-
ess, would always be present in our mind as a directing and
controlling prototype.
The more obvious it becomes that mathematical concepts
and real things belong to two different spheres, the more diffi-
cult grows the question: how is it possible that even the subtlest
and most complicated mathematical relations and laws find
217
218 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
their successful application to the world of reality? Only two
directly opposite philosophical tendencies naive empiricism
and absolute idealism avoid with ease this epistemological
difficulty; but they both do it at the cost of even greater diffi-
culties. Empiricism locates the source of mathematical notions
and conceptions in the sphere of real things, without being able
to explain satisfactorily their absolute validity and necessity,
the infinite character of their methods of construction and cal-
culation. And absolute idealism does exactly the opposite: in
its mystical belief in the infinite power of human reason, it
regards all real things as derived in all their qualities and func-
tions from this reason; it disregards the simple fact that reason
may be largely instrumental in the understanding of the uni-
verse. At the same time, the conception that reason "creates"
the universe is overbearing and ridiculously false.
Plato's idealism reveals its close connection with Orphism in
its conception of the Idea as a prototype of which real things
endeavor to partake; and it discloses the same exaggerated be-
lief in the power of the human mind in its ethical teaching of
virtue as the knowledge of good. Yet the revival of Platonism
in modern times struck deep roots in the realm of exact knowl-
edge and influenced decisively the founders of exact science:
Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo. The problem of knowledge
ceased to be the concern of pure philosophy only the great
men of science felt keenly the desire to elucidate this problem
and to understand the very nature the principles, the methods,
the attainable goals of the creative work they were doing.
Exact science, this rewriting of nature in mathematical letters,
became now a crucial test of man's successful mental conquest of
nature, and this fact induced Ernst Cassirer to devote a large
part of his research to this field of human knowledge: "only
in exact science in its progress which, despite all vacillation,
is continuous does the harmonious concept of knowledge ob-
tain its true accomplishment and verification; everywhere else
this concept still remains only a demand." 1
To this problem the contribution of exact science to epis-
1 Ernst Cassirer, Das Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosofhie und Wissenschaft
der neueren Zeit. Vol. I., p. 1 1 .
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 219
temology Cassirer devoted constant and assiduous study
throughout his entire life. He first approached the problem
from the historical point of view he showed how slowly and
painfully the scientific notion of nature detached itself from
purely mystical and metaphysical conceptions. Even Coperni-
cus, who methodically controlled and reversed immediate sen-
sory impressions by mathematical reasoning and proceeded upon
the principle "Mathemata mathematicis scribuntur? introduced
aesthetic motives into his demonstrations and regarded, for in-
stance, our sun as the center of the entire universe, since no
other place would be more suitable to its dignity and majestic
brilliancy.
It was Leonardo da Vinci who freed exact science from all
arbitrary elements and waged a systematic battle against all
attempts to introduce spiritual causes into the explanation of
physical phenomena. (Only mathematics, every concept and
law of which is permeated by the spirit of absolute necessity, is
able to provide us with an adequate basis upon which to build
our knowledge of nature.) Kepler already had gone so far as
not only to recognize clearly both sense impressions and intel-
lectual concepts as fundamental sources of our knowledge of
nature, but also to emphasize their thorough and organic in-
terrelation. According to him, perception incites and controls
our reasoning and is a genuine and reliable beginning of our
knowledge; but all this only because it contains though in a
hidden and obscure form elements of intellectual concepts and
mathematical relations.
All these basic tendencies were decisively deepened and en-
larged by Galileo. He, too, recognized sense impressions as a
fundamental source of our knowledge; yet for him these im-
pressions did not remain in the realm of individual perceptions
rather they acquired the form of organically unified experi-
ence, founded upon and formed by mathematical concepts and
laws of absolute necessity. Truth is what is organically con-
nected with the whole of experience, what belongs to this whole
as a consistent part of it; and the knowledge of any single fact
is only possible by way of studying its relations to the totality
of known and established facts.
220 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
The second generation of great scientists Huyghens, Boyle,
and Newton showed much less interest in general episte-
mological problems and tried primarily to purify and clarify
their experimental methods. They tried to avoid all general
concepts and theories and they went so far in this direction that
as Goethe put it "they expressed the clear intention to
observe natural phenomena as well as their own experiments
separately, placing them side by side and without making any
attempt to connect them somehow artificially with one another."
Yet, continued Goethe, they put a firm trust in mathematics and
stood in awe before the usefulness of its application to physics
and thus, "while they tried to be on their guard with ideality,
they admitted and kept the highest ideality." Those great
scientists and especially the greatest of them, Newton de-
veloped their mathematical methods to an amazing degree,
methods which enabled them meticulously to control their
experiments and to deduce from them exact and fundamental
knowledge. Newton's purely mathematical and seemingly quite
abstract concepts of "absolute" space and time, of force and
movement, soon became the very foundation of all physical
science. The basic epistemological problem the application of
ideal concepts to reality attained, through Newton's pro-
cedure, such a degree of precision that it soon became the focal
point of an impassioned and prolonged controversy in which
Clarke, Leibniz, and Euler played the leading part, and which
so decisively influenced the young Kant that not only did New-
ton's system become the very object of his theoretical philoso-
phy, but Kant even tried to introduce Newton's methods into
philosophy.
In the first two volumes of his Erkenntnisproblem in der
Philosophie und Wissenschaft der neueren Zeit Cassirer de-
scribed and analyzed, step by step, the historical development
of the struggle of human thought with this basic epistemologi-
cal question} the same question lies at the core of his extended
work, Substanzbegrif und Funktionsbegriff. In this book, how-
ever, Cassirer's approach to the problem is different here he
seeks the solution by a subtle analysis and systematic recon-
struction of the whole complex of epistemological principles
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 221
and methods. His first step is to show that a logical concept is
never a simple summing up of qualities common to a certain
group of similar things} before this summing up can take place
the human mind must have the ability to establish in its con-
sciousness such a grouping of similar things. This is done by a
special mental process of identification which establishes a
criterion. This process of identification, using any one particular
as an instance which satisfi.es the conditions set forth by the
criterion, collects a group of similar particulars, related to one
another, and bound together by the criterion common to them
all. The material of our perceptions can be formed and ordered
in many different ways according to the criterion which is used
in any single case; every given criterion forms a special series of
perceptions in which a certain relation among the single ele-
ments of this series prevails. This relation can be determined
by the degree of similarity or difference among the successive
terms of the given series, but it also can be determined by num-
ber or size, by dimensions of space or time.
This structure of concept as a succession of terms connected
with one another by a certain criterion Cassirer named "func-
tional" concept. Mathematical concepts are all of this kind
what an integral number is can be understood only if this num-
ber is regarded as a term within an infinite series where the
relation of any two contiguous terms is that of n to n + 1 }
negative, fractional, irrational and even transcendent numbers
can be defined only as terms of infinite series whose structure is
determined by certain rules, according to which all terms of
these series are connected with one another and derived from
one another. This holds true of all fields of mathematical science
geometry and algebra, the infinitesimal calculus, quantum
theory, and so forth. As Georg Cantor once said, mathematics is
a free science, free in the sense that its concepts are neither de-
rived from nor limited by the world of real things. Infinity
is the very soul of mathematical concepts} and the law which
determines the relation between single terms spreads endlessly
in all directions and forms a perfectly harmonious system whose
every term is bound by infinite relations to all other terms of the
same system.
222 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
The concepts of mechanics reveal the same nature, the same
inward structure as the mathematical concepts. Take as ex-
amples the concepts of velocity as uniform and rectilinear
motion, of uniform acceleration, of continuous space and of
mass reduced to a point they all represent ideal constructions
and criteria determining an infinite succession of forms, which
can be derived from one another according to a constant rule.
Yet, all these sharply and exactly formed ideal concepts not
only help and further our knowledge of real things, but they
actually constitute the very foundation of this knowledge. In
order to understand this paradox one must ask himself the
following question: what exactly is it to which we apply these
ideal notions? Is it sensations, perceptions, or objects of the
external world? The philosophy of critical idealism, whose basic
tendencies Cassirer faithfully espoused and strongly developed
throughout his life, gives the following answer: the primary
stuff of our consciousness consists of disconnected, fluctuating,
chaotic sensations, into which the human mind slowly and
steadily brings regularity and order by connecting (and bind-
ing) dispersed sensations and forming them into objects. It
would be quite wrong to think that there exist two sharply
separated realms the realm of sensations and the realm of
objects and that the true goal of our knowledge consists in
an unequivocal connection of sensations with the corresponding
objects. The truth is that in the given form these two separated
realms do not exist at all and that the actual process of our
knowledge consists in something quite different. Take the
simplest sensation, and you will find present in it already a
considerable amount of objective elements. Modern psychology
teaches us that an infant of six months, not yet able to distin-
guish separate sensations from one another, is, none the less,
already able to comprehend the expressions of his mother's face
correctly, and consequently feels whether his mother is pleased
with him or not. On the other hand, take any object, even a
highly complex and well known one, and you will always find
that some subjective impressions doggedly stick to it. What
really and truly is going on in our consciousness is not a grasp-
ing at objects but a continuous process of objectification the
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 223
raw material of our sensations is gradually and systematically
being worked over by the concepts and methods of our mind,
is being formed and objectified; what we name "objects" are
in reality nothing else but more or less advanced stages of this
infinite process of obj edification. A completely finished object,
one freed of all elements of uncertainty and subjectivity, can
be given only as the ultimate result of the development of
science, it is the infinite and final goal of human knowledge.
And, conversely, our sensations are always, to a greater or
smaller degree, imbued with elements of objectivity an abso-
lutely pure sensation is only thinkable as the ultimate result of
an endless process of subjectification.
These considerations open the way toward the solution of our
epistemological problem: the profuse and fruitful application of
the ideal concepts of mathematics and mechanics to the world
of real things. Now we can see just what made this problem so
difficult: the primary separation into two different and inde-
pendent worlds the world of ideal concepts and the world
of real things is nothing more than a wrong presumption.
Take, for instance, sudh a "real thing" as matter which sur-
rounds us everywhere in such impressive quantities. Greek
science first thought that matter was continuous substance; then
it surmised that matter was of atomic structure. And now we
know that matter is nothing but condensed energy and that this
energy has miraculously enough an atomic structure! Our
knowledge of the atomic bomb no matter how real and potent
its destructive power may be is still only one, and by no means
the final, stage within the infinite process of objectification; and
our ideal concepts of mathematics and mechanics are the driving
forces, which mold and regulate this process, which transform
our sensations into more and more advanced stages of objectifi-
cation. The intellect and its ideal concepts from the outset
perform an organic and absolutely necessary function within
this process no knowledge of real things would be possible
without them.
Guided by this conviction, Cassirer, in his book, Substanz-
begrif und Funktionsbegrifi, unfolded step by step the syste-
matic work of objectification performed by natural science and
224 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
showed the basic importance of some very complicated branches
of mathematics, including the quantum theory. However,
strangely enough, not once in this book did he mention the
theory of relativity, although Einstein's first fundamental
publication concerning this subject had appeared five years
earlier and had aroused a truly sensational interest. In 1921,
two years after Einstein's concept of the curvature of light
(when it passes through a field of gravitation) was brilliantly
proved by astronomical observations, Cassirer published a book-
let on the theory of relativity. Yet even in 1910 Einstein's
theory was already very much talked of, and that not merely
in scientific circles, but everywhere and by everyone. Thus,
there must have been some reasons for Cassirer's silence on
relativity at that time, which should prove to be of great inter-
est, if it could be discovered what "precisely" the reasons were.
In his first publication on the theory of relativity, the famous
"Elektrodynamik bewegter Systeme," (1905), Einstein, for the
first time in the history of human thought, put the following
question in so many words: We all know Newton's definition of
"absolute, true, and mathematical time;" but in what way can
this concept be applied to the world of real occurrences? Sup-
pose, for some special purpose, we have to synchronize three
watches one in New York, another in San Francisco, and the
third halfway between them, say in Norfolk, Nebraska. The
only correct way to do that would be to send, let us say at 12:00
P.M. sharp, a light signal from Norfolk to the two other cities,
and when this signal would arrive in each of the two cities, the
time on their watches should be put at 12:00 P.M. plus one
hundredth of a second, since it would take the light signal that
much time to reach those cities. This procedure seems to be
quite correct and even matter-of-course; yet Einstein proved
that it was incorrect, since it did not allow for the rotation of
the earth. In our example the light signal would reach New
York earlier than San Francisco, since New York would, so
to speak, move to meet this signal, whereas San Francisco
would, as it were, run away from it. Thus, concluded Einstein,
time, within a given system, depends on whether this system
is moving or not and if it is on the velocity of its movement.
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 225
In a second example Einstein showed that there is only one
way to measure the length of a moving object, namely, to use
light signals and synchronized watches; but, inasmuch as syn-
chronization of watches depends upon the movement of a given
system, the length of an object must also depend on this move-
ment.
These two examples given by Einstein were so surprisingly
novel, so impressive, so convincingly true that the attention of
the scientific world was immediately focused on him. However,
this was only the beginning $ he also discovered other most in-
genious and important physical laws, as, for instance, the exact
correlation between electric and magnetic fields, and, in particu-
lar, the relation between mass and energy: E = mc 2 ; this
formula was made so popular by the atomic bomb that one can
now find it even in newspaper advertisements. The great
authority of Einstein as a true genius of natural science was,
thus, firmly and indisputably established.
And yet: an objective study of the whole complex of Ein-
stein's theories shows clearly that there is also another side to
them and that Einstein's case at certain points repeats a phe-
nomenon which is sometimes met in the history of natural
science, namely, that a well recognized authority advances a
theory which is obviously inconsistent and later may even be
proved wrong. Yet such a theory may nevertheless be immedi-
ately accepted and, supported as it is by the weighty name of
its famous originator, it is likely to become a part of accepted
science. The most striking example of this kind is provided by
the physics of Aristotle: as late as in the seventeenth century
the official doctrine in physics accepted Aristotle's thesis that
the velocity of a falling object is proportional to its weight;
viz., ten bricks tied together fall ten times faster to the earth
than a single brick; or that a stone dropped on a moving ship
from the top of a mast falls not to the base of this mast but
into the water, an experiment Aristotle allegedly performed
many times. So great was Aristotle's authority that the physi-
cians among his followers implicitly believed his assertion that
the heart is the center of the nervous system. Galileo tells us
that ^t one time a human body was dissected in the presence
226 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
of a large group of Aristotelians and the dissection incontro-
vertibly proved that it is the brain which is the center of the
nervous system. Thereupon the spokesman of the Aristotelians
declared: "You gave us such clear and evident proof, that, were
it not asserted by Aristotle that the nerve-center lies in the
heart, we would be forced to the admission that you are right."
Yet, Aristotle is not the only great authority of whom this
sort of thing is true. Other instances could easily be cited. But
this is not the place for such however interesting stories.
Something akin to it we find in some elements of Einstein's
theory of relativity. Having proved that the necessity of using
light signals for the measurement of time and space in moving
systems is bound to influence the results of this measurement,
Einstein, without reason or explanation, stops following up
this absolutely correct and revolutionary idea and supersedes
it by another explanation which is quite wrong: in a moving
system the time and the length of objects change because the
movement of a system influences the motion of watch mecha-
nisms by slowing them down and influences the length of ma-
terial objects by physically contracting them. This sounds so
incredible that we must quote Einstein himself. "A balanced
watch placed on the equator moves by a very small amount
slower than an exactly identical watch would move under other-
wise quite identical conditions except that it is placed at the
pole." 2 In this quotation Einstein does not speak of the watch
in general, but rather he stresses that it has to be a balanced
watch. Why? Because, according to Einstein and his most
famous followers, like, for instance, Max von Laue, only the
balance wheel (this regulating gear of a watch), is slowed
down by the velocity of the moving system to which this
watch belongs. At once the question arises: And how about other
kinds of timepieces which work without coiling spring and
balance wheel, for instance, clepsydra or hourglass? Einstein
did not think of them; yet he did think of the pendulum-clock,
and therefore added the following words: a balance-watch "in
* Einstein's "Elektrodynamik bewegter Systeme," reprinted in the Fortschritte der
mathematmhen Wissenschaften, No. 2, p. 38. (Translation by the present writer.)
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 227
opposition to a balance-clock which represents from the point
of view of physics the same system as the terrestrial globe;
this case has to be excluded," If what Einstein says here is true,
then there is nothing easier than to avoid all complications by
simply using pendulum-clocks exclusively, never the balance-
watches j then the theory of relativity would not be a novel and
revolutionary conception of time and space, but merely a ques-
tion of using incorrect or correct technical instruments. Yet
Einstein's attempt to make his theory dependent on the kind
of timepieces used is just as strange and contains just as much
truth as, for instance, the assertion that the validity of non-
Euclidean geometry depends on the type of glasses a mathema-
tician wears.
Einstein's so-called special theory of relativity, the only one
to which we are here referring, did not introduce any new
mathematical formula; it was rather an attempt to give a new
interpretation to the Lorentz-transformation, and the fallacy
of Einstein's interpretation could not in any way invalidate
the importance and fruitfulness of the Lorentz-transformation.
Yet this fallacy of interpretation is the source of all the para-
doxes and inconsistencies of Einstein's theory. Take, for
instance, the so-called and very famous at that "paradox
of the watch" which Einstein later expressed in the following
drastic form:
If we could put a living organism into a box and compel it to perform
the same regular movements as a balance-watch does, then it would be
possible to achieve that this organism would return to its starting place
after as long a flight as you like and would not show any changes what-
soever, whereas quite similar organisms which all this time stayed quietly
in their place would be superseded by several consecutive generations.
The long time which this journey lasted was for the moving organism
not more than one single moment, provided only that it moved approxi-
mately with the velocity of light. This is an inevitable consequence of
our fundamental principles imposed upon us by experimental knowledge. 8
In reading these words one involuntarily thinks of what
'Einstein, "Die Relativitatstheorie." Vierteljahnschrift der naturforsckenden
Gesellschaft, Zurich, Vol. 56, p. 12. (Translation by the present writer.)
228 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
Aristotle said after asserting that a stone, dropped on a moving
ship from the top of the mast, falls into the water: "This experi-
ment I performed several times." First of all, Einstein's allega-
tion completely contradicts Einstein's own "fundamental princi-
ple" of relativity. According to this principle, movement is
always relative to some other system, and there is no way of
ascertaining which of these two systems really moves and which
is in the state of immobility, or which part of this relative move-
ment is performed by either of these systems. Yet Einstein's
example of a moving organism brings back the idea of absolute
movement: the surviving organism was really in a state of
motion, whereas the extinct generations were in a state of im-
mobility. Furthermore, the assertion that time slows down
under the influence of movement is quite wrong. If one follows
up Einstein's brilliant example of the synchronization of three
watches in three different cities, one finds the following phe-
nomenon: so long as a watch recedes from the observer, the time
on this watch appears to him as retarded; but the moment this
watch begins approaching the observer, the time on it appears
as accelerated in the same degree, and as an ultimate result there
is absolutely no loss or gain of time. 4
Truth is always simple, understandable, impressive. This is
the case with all elements of Einstein's theory which are veri-
fiably correct. Only those elements of Einstein's theory are
difficult which are basically wrong. The famous originator of
the quantum theory, Max Planck, once said of the theory of
relativity: "It is hardly necessary to emphasize that this novel
conception of time puts the highest demands upon the power
of imagination of a physicist and upon his ability of abstraction.
Its boldness surpasses everything which previously had been
accomplished in the speculative philosophy of nature and even
in philosophical epistemologyj compared to it, non-Euclidean
geometry is mere child's play." 5 It certainly was not Einstein's
intention to enrich the "speculative philosophy of nature" with
4 See my booklet, "Der fkysikalische Gehalt der speziellen Relattvitatstheorie,"
Stuttgart, Engelhorns.
8 Max Planck, Acht Vorlesungen iiber theoretische Phy$ik t 1910, p. 117.
(Translation by the present writer.)
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 229
his theory ; he is a great physicist, and some parts of his theory
will probably live forever in the science of men; but the in-
correct parts of his theory belong nowhere, not even to specula-
tive philosophy.
It is most interesting to observe in what manner Cassirer, in
his booklet, 7,wr Einstein* schen Relativitatstheorie, deals with
the theory of relativity, this amazing combination of profound
truths and striking inconsistencies. Cassirer knew Einstein per-
sonally and, as he tells in the preface to his booklet, showed the
manuscript to Einstein before having it printed. In the whole
booklet one does not find one single word of criticism or doubt;
at the same time, only those elements of Einstein's theory are
discussed which are undoubtedly fruitful and true. Cassirer
regards the theory of relativity as one link in the long chain of
scientific and philosophical development, as an important con-
stituent in the whole structure of epistemology. He starts with
the general problem of measuring and shows that it is the first
step to the objectification of our sensations, their transformation
into elements of scientific experience. Our methods of measuring
are always based upon some principles and axioms. One of these
axioms always was that units of time, length, mass, are quite
independent of whether they are applied in a moving or a
motionless system. Einstein showed the incorrectness of this
axiom by proving that these units themselves depend on the
velocity of a given system. Cassirer does not at all discuss the
question: What is the cause of this change? He does not even
mention Einstein's explanation according to which even uniform
and rectilinear motion physically affects the mechanism of a
watch, an explanation which, by the way, directly contradicts
Galileo's and Newton's principle of inertia.
In order to explain the crisis into which science was thrown
by the negative result of Michelson's experiment, let me use
the following imaginary example: an observer on a highway
sees an automobile moving with the velocity of a hundred miles
per hour; at the same time he sees a plane flying in the same
direction with the velocity of three hundred miles per hour;
the observer does not doubt for a moment that if the passen-
gers of the car compared their velocity with the velocity of the
230 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
plane they would find a difference of two hundred miles.
How greatly amazed one would be, if he were told that in
relation to him the plane still flies at the velocity of three
hundred miles! Einstein's method of solving this difficulty was
the following: he showed on the examples of synchronization
of watches and measuring of length within a moving system
that both operations could be performed only with the help
of light signals; and then he said (not literally, to be sure):
You see, our units of time and length are not at all as matter-
of-course as we used to think of them; they are rather uncertain,
they change along with the velocity of a given system, and,
since this is the case, why should we not presuppose that the
changes these units undergo are just big enough to explain the
fact that our plane flies relatively both to the highway and to
the speeding car with the same velocity of three hundred miles?
One can hardly regard this as a solution to our problem, in-
asmuch as the problem itself is simply transformed into a sup-
position. At the same time Einstein's analysis of the problem of
synchronization contains all the elements of the correct solu-
tion. Yet, amazingly enough, he did not follow up the novel
and most promising road he had himself discovered. But this
method to transform the problem into a supposition Ein-
stein used once more, when he replaced Newton's law of gravi-
tation with a slightly different law of a very complicated mathe-
matical structure. Newton derived his law of gravitation from
Kepler's third law of planetary motion; this was a simple and
most convincing demonstration of Newton's law. Einstein's
procedure was different; he tried to construct a mathematical
formula which had to satisfy the following conditions: to con-
tain Newton's formula as first approximation and to produce the
amount of the perihelion movement of the planet Mercury; it
was an ad hoc formula, a transformation of a problem into a
supposition.
Cassirer does not criticize or reject this procedure; he gives
a quite adequate description of it and introduces his own analysis
with the following spirited words of Goethe: "The highest art
in science and life consists in transforming a problem into a
postulate; one gets through this way." But Cassirer does not
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 231
dwell on this subject} whereas Einstein's conception of matter
as condensed energy, this daring and practically most important
of his theories, is discussed at great length. Cassirer shows that
the entire history of physics had been dominated by a peculiar
dualism in the apprehension of nature. Democritus introduced
the concepts of the atom and of empty space as the only sources
of physical reality. In the subsequent centuries this dualism
transformed itself into the acceptance of pure form concepts
(like space and time), on the one hand, and of substance con-
cepts (like matter), on the other. Descartes was the first to
attempt a unification of these two concept groups} by levelling
any distinction between them he dissolved, as it were, the sub-
stance of a physical object into a system of purely geometrical
relations. Yet Cartesian physics proved to be ineffectual, and
Newton refuted Descartes 1 physical theories and went back to
the old dualism of space as a kind of a vessel and of matter as
substance contained in it. Faraday was the first to bring about
a new conception of matter, by advancing the theory that matter
consists of lines of force, that it is nothing but a spot within a
field of force. This theory stirred up a strong development of
the so-called "field-physics," which did not accept the existence
of matter and space as two separate factors, but regarded matter
as an "offspring of field." Einstein's theory of relativity repre-
sents the last link within this development} it does not accept
space, time, matter, and force as independent factors, but re-
gards the physical world as a four-dimensional multiplicity.
Along with this new conception of the world another historical
development has been brought to its conclusion. Leibniz already
had completely dissolved matter into force, yet he retained a
distinction between two kinds of forces, "active" and "passive"
forces. Einstein's theory brings about the ultimate fusion be-
tween the two fundamental principles of modern physics
the principle of the conservation of mass and the principle of the
conservation of energy. The qualitative difference between
matter and energy disappears entirely.
This method is typical of Cassirer's treatment of Einstein's
theory the historical continuity of scientific thought appears
clearly and convincingly in Cassirer's argumentation. The prin-
232 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
ciples of physics introduced by Galileo and further developed
by Newton are only confirmed and enlarged in the theory of
relativity. And since Cassirer, with his keen sense of con-
sistency and exactness of scientific truth, concentrated his atten-
tion only on those elements of Einstein's theory which are
correct and fruitful, Cassirer acquitted himself of this task most
brilliantly. He does not mention with even one single word
Einstein's assertion that uniform and rectilinear movement
influences a watch mechanism and slows it down, or that this
movement keeps a living organism indefinitely alive, or that
there is a basic difference between a balance-watch and pendu-
lum-clock. Only one of Einstein's assertions is casually men-
tioned by Cassirer, despite the fact that it definitely belongs
to the group of erroneous elements within Einstein's theory.
I am referring to Einstein's assertion (repeated several times
by himself, and many thousands of times by his followers) that
Euclidean geometry loses its validity within a system which is
in a state of motion, even of uniform and rectilinear motion.
Take, for instance, the ratio of the circumference of a circle to
its diameter (pi); it changes its value within such a moving
system, it becomes smaller, according to Einstein. Why? The
reason, says Einstein, is quite simple. If you have a rotating
disk, then, since all moving objects become shorter in the di-
rection of their movement, the circumference of this disk will
be smaller than the circumference of the same disk in the state
of immobility, and the corresponding ratio will drop below pi.
This whole argument is entirely wrong $ and the fact that so
many earnest scientists willingly accepted it is very strange
indeed. This is such a striking example of mass-suggestion (not
to say gullibility) in the field of "exact" ( ! ) science that it is
worth while to dwell a bit more upon this subject.
In order to prove that moving objects become shorter in the
direction of their movement, Einstein invented a very ingenious
example which, when adapted to American geography, might
take the following form: suppose that an immensely long air-
ship of approximately 3000 miles in length is flying in west-
east direction over American territory, with one end over San
Francisco and the other end over New York, just at the moment
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 233
when we are trying to find out the precise length of this air-
ship. There is only one way to do that, namely, to notice, at
precisely the same moment, both ends of the airship, one in
San Francisco and the other in New York, and then figure out
the distance between these markings. For this purpose we must
have perfectly synchronized watches placed in both cities. Yet
this is impossible, as we have already seen the watch in San
Francisco will be slower than the watch in New York; there-
fore we shall be marking the rear end of the airship later than
the front end, and the airship will consequently appear to us
to be shortened. Very well. But now suppose that two airships
move simultaneously, but in opposite directions is it not abso-
lutely clear that in this case the second ship will appear longer
in exact proportion as the first ship will appear shorter? Thus,
if you take a rotating disk, you will have to admit by the same
reasoning that, since the two halves of its circumference always
move in opposite direction, one half shortens in exactly the same
proportion in which the other half lengthens 5 the effect of
rotation is neutralized, pi remains absolutely unchanged, and
there is no reason whatsoever to dethrone Euclidean geometry
on this illusory ground.
During the last years of his stay in Germany Cassirer devoted
increasingly more time to the study of the quantum theory, and
when, in the spring of 1933, he decided to leave Germany, he
went to Switzerland and there he wrote the first draft of his
Determinismus und Indeterminismus in der modernen Phystk.
This book was his last major contribution to epistemology and
to the philosophy of natural science. The subsequent years of
his life, with their frequent peregrinations and changes of place
of activity, deprived him to some degree of the steady tran-
quillity which was so favorable to his assiduous work. Besides,
the new social phenomenon which suddenly appeared on the
stage of history and at once began threatening the future of
mankind totalitarianism based upon and supported by the
fanaticism of deceived masses moved Cassirer to transfer the
center of gravity of his studies to the problems of social science.
Quantum theory and the theory of relativity are the two
outstanding: achievements of theoretical phvsics in the last half-
234 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
century. Yet, how different was their ultimate fate! Max Planck
was compelled to advance his incredible and almost incompre-
hensible conception that energy has a discontinuous structure
and consists of elementary quanta, of which all other amounts of
energy are multiples, since otherwise it was impossible to ex-
plain the peculiar and quite "unclassical" manner in which
energy is radiated by a black body. From the outset it was
obvious that here a perfectly new and truly revolutionary
principle was being introduced into physics. Yet Planck tried
by every means to retain the continuity of scientific thought and
was only willing to admit the quite "inevitable deviation from
the laws of electrodynamics in the smallest possible degree.
Therefore, as far as it concerns the influence of a radiation field
upon an oscillator, we go hand in hand with the classical
theory." 6 Which means that Planck, although accepting energy
quanta for the radiation, still retained the point of view of
classical physics upon the absorption of energy by an oscillator.
From the very beginning Planck based his theory strictly upon
experience and experiment, and his hypothesis, despite its
breath-taking character, advanced therefore from one great
triumph to another, never meeting with any serious opposition.
The road of the theory of relativity was quite different. Ein-
stein made a great discovery by recognizing the decisive role
the light signals play in the measuring of time and space ; this
discovery was in perfect harmony with the Galileo-Newtonian
mechanics} it was a correct and most important materialization
of their general concepts of time and space. Yet, instead of con-
tinuing this line of development, he made a quite inconsistent
and "anti-classical" supposition to the effect that uniform and
rectilinear motion influence the mechanism of a balance-watch.
This was a violent and quite unwarranted break with classical
mechanics. And the paradoxes involved in the suppositions of
a living organism surviving in a fraction of a second several
consecutive generations of its kind, or of a rotating disk invali-
dating Euclidean geometry, helped to create such an unsound
9 Max Planck, Vorlesungen iiber die Theorie der W armestrahlung y 3rd Ed. p.
148. Quotation taken from Cassirer's book, p. 136 (Translation by the present
writer) .
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 235
sensation around this theory that it slowly became even a
political issue the reactionaries were against it because of Ein-
stein's Jewish lineage, and the communists were for it because
of the "revolutionary spirit" of this theory. A line of cleavage
in the field of science which is nothing short of scandalous. But
now back to Cassirer's book, Determinismus und Indeter-
minismus.
Cassirer's first step consists in the analyzing of the factual
procedure of physics, of the concrete way in which it achieves
its knowledge of nature. He distinguishes three different forms
of assertion within the physical sciences, three basically differ-
ent stages on the way towards the obj edification of our "world
of sense" into the "world of physics." The first form of physi-
cal assertions Cassirer calls "judgments concerning measure-
ment" the data of our perceptions are gradually transformed,
with the aid of concepts of measurement and of number, into
more and more objectified assertions. The sensibility of our
organs of perception is superseded by the sensibility of our
physical instruments. In this way the material of our knowl-
edge has increased tremendously and the horizon of reality has
been widened in all directions. This enriched material of our
experience becomes the basis for the next step, for its unifica-
tion and systematization with the help of natural laws; Cassirer
called this stage of objectification "assertions about laws." These
laws combine smaller or larger groups of facts into one single
formula. Yet our science does not stop here} it is not satisfied
with unification of innumerable facts through a limited system
of lawsj it constantly explores the possibility of unifying these
laws, of connecting them with one another and sometimes de-
riving them from one another. This endeavor characterizes the
third stage of objectification which Cassirer calls "assertions of
principles." Thus, D'Alembert's "principle of virtual displace-
ment" made possible the unification of statics and dynamics
under one and the same system of mechanical laws; and the
principle of conservation of energy builds bridges connecting all
branches of physics.
Yet human thought does not confine itself to these three
stages of physical knowledge it belongs to the very essence of
236 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
the human mind to continue the search for ever more and more
general laws and principles, and it finds such in the systems of
mathematical, logical, and epistemological concepts. The law of
causation belongs to the system of epistemological concepts; it
does not contain any assertion about this or that special occur-
rence in nature; it only asserts the thorough and consistent uni-
formity of all natural events and of nature as a whole. Every
single law of nature may some day turn out to be incorrect, even
the sunrise in the morning; yet, even if this event should occur,
one thing will be absolutely certain: there will be some cause
for that event. Without this law of causation no natural laws,
and, therefore, no human knowledge is possible.
The law of causation was always regarded as the main pillar
of the classical physics. But when the development of the
quantum theory convincingly revealed its fundamental differ-
ence from the classical physics, there appeared a tendency within
this theory to break even with causality and to replace the classi-
cal determinism with a modernized form of indeterminism.
This attack upon the law of causation has been launched by
some physicists mainly from the following point of view: the
first point of view is based upon a statistical interpretation of
quantum theory it operates only with immense numbers of
elementary particles of electricity and denies the possibility of a
precise description of the conditions of single elements within
a given system; only laws of probability can be applied to such
systems, only statistical results can be obtained by these laws
there remains, therefore, no place for causation within these
systems. It is with ease that Cassirer uncovers the fallacy of this
point of view. Statistical results, he points out, very often have
the character of strict necessity; the only condition being that
they must not be arbitrary or incoherent, but based upon laws.
The kinetic theory of gases is the best example of how statistical
methods and laws of probability lead to strict uniformity and,
therefore, to a complete vindication of the law of causation.
The second point of view which has led to the denial of
causality is more radical, even if not so well founded. This
attack is led by the well-known physicist and Nobel prize-
winner Heisenberg and is based upon his principle of "uncer-
EPISTEMOLOGY OF PHYSICS 237
tainty" or "indeterminacy." All elements of physical observa-
tion and experiment are given to us, says Heisenberg, not in the
form of absolutely exact knowledge, not as Kantian trans-
cendent "things-in-themselves" rather they are the results of
our instruments of measurement and depend strictly on the
delicacy of these instruments. But this quite matter-of-course
fact leads us within the quantum theory to the following 'pe-
culiar paradox: suppose that an observer has the task of deter-
mining exactly the position and the velocity of an electron; in
order to do that he must irradiate this electron and put it under
a microscope 5 the experiment shows that the shorter the waves
of light are which we use for this irradiation the more exactly
can the position of this electron be determined ; but at the same
time the electron, as a result of the "Compton-effect," changes
its velocity, and this change is the greater the shorter are the
waves of the irradiating light. Thus, concludes Heisenberg, it
is quite impossible simultaneously to perform an exact measure-
ment of both the position and the velocity of an electron, since
the more exact one measurement is the more uncertain the other
one becomes. Heisenberg's conclusion is: "Thus quantum me-
chanics has definitely established the worthlessness of the law of
causation."
It is almost incredible how many serious scientists have been
influenced by this conception of Heisenberg's. A new wave of
mass-suggestion was on the verge of submerging a large num-
ber of physicists people who by the very virtue of their pro-
fession should be fairly rational. Cassirer's attempt to combat
this contemporary aberration in science was quite timely, there-
fore. His method of demonstrating the erroneousness of Hei-
senberg's deduction was as simple as it was convincing. He
showed that Heisenberg, in order to demonstrate his "principle
of indeterminacy," at every step applied the very same law of
causation which he tried to disprove with the help of these
"uncertainty relations." Take, for example, the "Compton-
effect," upon which Heisenberg's demonstration rests; the im-
pact between light quanta and electrons makes an application
of the law of causation and yields experimental results strictly
in accordance with this law.
238 DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
Cassirer died less than four months before the first explosion
of the atomic bomb proved to the entire civilized world the
great danger which lies in the mere development of exact
science: it releases forces too powerful to be controlled j it makes
man so powerful that the very existence of mankind appears to
be endangered. This dark prospect reminds us of the philo-
sophical thesis Cassirer defended and developed all his life
that scientific progress is only beneficial for man in so far as it is
supported and guided by equally as vigorous progress of man's
ethical, spiritual, cultural, and social life.
DIMITRY GAWRONSKY
NEW YORK CITY
6
Harold R. Smart
CASSIRER'S THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL
CONCEPTS
CASSIRER'S THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL
CONCEPTS
IN AN important article in Kantstudien (XII, 1907), en-
titled "Kant und die moderne Mathematik," Cassirer
makes an assertion which throws much light on his theory of
mathematical concepts. He declares that "it cannot be denied
that c Logistik' [i.e., symbolic or mathematical logic] has revivi-
fied formal logic, and . . . nourished it anew with the life blood
of science." And this development, he continues, is of great sig-
nificance with respect to Kantian doctrines. Although it is cer-
tainly true that symbolic logic "can never supplant or replace
'transcendental' logic," it is equally certain that formal logic
as thus rejuvenated "offers more pregnant suggestions and
affords more trustworthy 'guiding threads' than Kant possessed
in the traditional logic of his time."
This statement clearly foreshadows one of the principal
tasks Cassirer set himself early in his career, which he has
attempted to carry through by means of his profound and criti-
cal study of the history of mathematics in its relations both with
philosophy and with the other sciences, from the earliest times
down to the immediate present. That it is a truly formidable
undertaking thus to seek to preserve and reinterpret the tran-
scendental logic of Kant in such a way as finally to bring it into
good and fruitful accord with recent tendencies in formal sym-
bolic logic and mathematics, will readily be admitted. Indeed,
it is not going too far to say that most authorities would at the
very outset declare that purpose to be one which could not
possibly be realized 5 so far apart are Kantian doctrines at
least as usually presented and those of most contemporary
logicians and mathematicians, that, like oil and water, they
simply cannot be made to mix.
241
242 HAROLD R. SMART
Did not Kant firmly declare that concepts without percepts
are empty ; was it not his settled doctrine that mathematical
judgments are synthetic a priori; did he not maintain, at least
in the "transcendental aesthetic," that mathematics is possible
as a science only because space and time are pure forms of intui-
tion or pure intuitions} was it not in particular his thesis that
mathematical inference proceeds by means of Constructions'
which must be either directly intuitable in actual space, or
clearly imaginable? Taking these and kindred doctrines into
account, is it not the consensus of authoritative commentators
that Kant deceived himself both in underestimating the revo-
lutionary character of his contributions to logic, and in cherish-
ing the belief that the validity of the main tenets of formal
logic was unimpaired thereby? And finally, do not contempo-
rary symbolic logicians and mathematicians, with one unani-
mous voice, sharply oppose every one of those typical Kantian
doctrines and assertions?
Initially improbable though success in such a venture might
seem, however, Cassirer does not shrink from facing coura-
geously all of the tremendous difficulties it involves; and what-
ever may be one's final judgment in the matter, all hands will
readily agree that, quite apart from his success or failure in this
particular regard, his own positive doctrines stand forth as of
intrinsic worth on their own account. It soon becomes clear,
indeed, to Cassirer's readers, that one has to do with no slavish
disciple of any of the traditional lines of thought. The historical
and critical studies so assiduously pursued are by no means
ends in themselves, but serve rather as most carefully selected
source material for constructive philosophical undertakings of
the most significant and original sort. Such being the case, it is
to be expected that the materials supplied in this way will be
handled with the greatest freedom and boldness, and that, as
finally presented, Cassirer's doctrines will frequently diverge
more or less widely from their anterior sources of inspiration.
Take, for example, the concept of number the concept
which Cassirer significantly declares to be not merely basic to
the special science of mathematics but "the first and truest
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 243
expression of rational method in general." 1 Although critics
frequently charge Kant with basing this concept upon the pure
intuition of time, this is true, so Cassirer avers, only in so far as
time appears as "the type of ordered sequence" as such. In
Kant's own words,
the pure image ... of all objects of the senses in general is time. But the
pure schema of quantity, in so far as it is a concept of the understanding,
is number, a representation which combines the successive addition of one
to one (homogeneous). Thus number is nothing but the unity of the
synthesis of the manifold of a homogeneous intuition in general a
unity due to the fact that I generate time itself in the apprehension of
the intuition. 2
As Cassirer sees it, however, further development of this
doctrine has followed two very different directions, the one
emphasizing the active 'understanding' and the process of
creative synthesis, the other stressing the passive 'sensibility'
and irrational intuition.
The latter alternative is that adopted, for example, by most
varieties of empiricism, and by intuitionism, and it naturally
conforms best to the traditional formal logic of the generic
concept i.e., the logic which regards the concept as a common
element abstracted from a class of particulars. 8 Against all three
of these lines of thought empiricism, intuitionism, and the
subject-predicate logic Cassirer brings to bear a devastating
criticism, supported by profuse historical evidence. These his-
torical and epistemological studies demonstrate convincingly
that in terms of no one, nor of any combination of the three,
can Kant's question as to the 'possibility' of the science of pure
mathematics be answered at all satisfactorily.
There remains, then, for further consideration, what Cassirer
regards as the only other genuine alternative, namely the
postulation of the creative synthesis of the pure understanding
1 Substance and Function, Eng. transl., 26.
8 Translation quoted from N. Kemp Smith's Commentary to Kant's Critique of
Pure Reason^ 2nd ed., 129. Cassirer makes a similar gloss on Kant's notion of space
with reference to geometry.
3 Philosophie der symbolischen Formen, Ch. Ill, 402!.
244 HAROLD R. SMART
as the absolutely essential epistemological and logical prius,
upon which the possibility of number in particular and of
mathematics in general must depend. In Kantian language, the
synthetic activity of knowing is a process of generating relations
i.e., to know is to relate} and to relate, so Cassirer continues,
is to introduce order into a 'manifold' or series; and serial order,
in this precise sense of the word, finds its first and fundamental
expression in the series of ordinal numbers. Logical or critical
idealism maintains, in short, that there is nothing more ultimate
for thought than thinking itself, and thinking consists essen-
tially in the positing of relations (das Beziehungssetzen).
From this point of view, Cassirer declares, "number appears
not merely as a production of pure thought, but actually as its
prototype and origin ... as the primary and original act of
thought, " which all further scientific and logical thinking
presupposes. 4 In this pregnant sense of the word, number is,
indeed, the "schema" of serial order in general, the "ideal
axis," so to speak, about which thought organizes its world.
Pythagoreanism erred only in its too enthusiastic identification
of number with the whole truth, with the entire system of ideal
relations constitutive of reality. Only "after we have conceived
the plan of this system in a general logical theory of rela-
tions," whereby the members of a series may be variously
ordered for example, "according to equality and inequality,
number and magnitude, spatial and temporal relations, . . .
causal dependence," and the like can we ascribe to the several
sciences their true epistemological import as so many progres-
sively successful applications of this logical theory to the data
of experience. 5
In further elucidation and development of this thesis
which is perhaps more accurately and directly anticipated by
the Cartesian-Leibnizian theory of a mathesls universalis than
it is by the Kantian transcendental logic Cassirer refers, on
the one hand, to the so-called calculus of relations as recently
worked out by the symbolic logicians, and, on the other hand,
to the relevant stages in the origination and subsequent history
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 245
of such basic mathematical concepts as those of number and
space.
The main purpose of the critical study of the history of
mathematics is to illustrate and confirm the special thesis that
ordinal number is logically prior to cardinal number, and, more
generally, that mathematics may be defined, in Leibnizian
fashion, as the science of order, Cassirer's readers do not need
to be told how impressive in both amount and quality is the
historical evidence he adduces in support of these tenets, nor
how great is the skill with which he marshalls his interpretative
expositions to the same end.
As Cassirer is no doubt well aware, however, other authori-
ties, among them some as critical of mere empiricism as he him-
self is, differ sharply with this interpretation of the same
historical data, and at least two other plausible alternatives have
been ably presented, namely the exactly opposite thesis that
cardinal number is logically prior to ordinals, and the perhaps
even more inviting thesis that cardinal and ordinal are strictly
complementary aspects of number, neither of which can claim
priority over the other. Thus it seems rather unwise to place
too much confidence in any one interpretation, unless indeed
weighty evidence of another sort can be marshalled in support
of one of the three, which cannot be matched in favor of either
or both of the others.
And of what sort can such evidence be? Not of any epistemo-
logical variety, it would seemj for to ground an historical
interpretation on an epistemological theory, and then to claim
that the interpretation confirms the theory, is hardly justifiable
at the bar of logic. As for the logical evidence, Cassirer himself
concedes that order "does not exhaust the whole content of the
concept of number. )>tt A "new aspect," he declares, "appears as
soon as number, which has hitherto been deduced as a purely
logical sequence of intellectual constructs, is understood and
applied as an expression of flwratity"
But when the question almost asks itself is it not so
understood and applied? Certainly many unbiassed witnesses
are prepared to answer, in no uncertain voice, that it functions
6 Substance and Function, 41.
246 HAROLD R. SMART
in this sense from the very beginning. Nay, testimony on this
point is well-nigh universal to the effect that 'in the beginning'
was simple counting, a process resting directly on the concept
of cardinal number. And, as far as contemporary logic is con-
cerned, an able expositor of the doctrines of Principa Mathe-
matica explains, in terms exactly matching those used by
Cassirer, but having a precisely opposite import, that "two
important concepts" essential to the formation of the series of
ordinal numbers, namely 'o 5 and 'successor,' "introduce a new
idea not used in the definition of cardinal number, namely the
idea that the cardinal numbers form a discrete series of next
successors beginning with o." 7
These comments are not offered, however, as by any means
indicating a complete refutation of Cassirer's doctrines, but
rather merely to reveal the diversity of views prevailing on
this matter. Epistemological theories apart, it is tacitly admitted
by all hands that cardinal and ordinal actually function, mathe-
matically, as complementary to each other. In any event,
Cassirer relies more heavily upon the aforementioned calculus
of relations, than he does upon the historical evidence, in direct
and positive support of his theory of the formation of mathe-
matical concepts. For it is by means of this calculus, so he avers,
that number can indeed be "deduced as a purely logical se-
quence of intellectual constructs." More specifically, in the
classification of relations into transitive, intransitive, symmetri-
cal, asymmetrical, and so on, Cassirer sees, ready to hand as it
were, the perfect instrumentality whereby "the more exact
definition of what we are to understand as the order of a given
whole" is to be attained. Prior to this development the basic
thesis of critical idealism, namely that thinking consists in the
positing or generating of relations, appeared as a bare epistemo-
logical postulate, illustrated, and even, if you please, in a sense
confirmed by the history of scientific thought, but all the while
lacking its fundamental logical articulation, its systematic expo-
sition and confirmation. In particular, to Bertrand Russell and
his colleagues Cassirer gratefully attributes the epochal dis-
T Eaton, General Logic, 468.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 247
covery "that it is always some transitive and asymmetrical rela-
tion that is necessary to imprint on the members of a whole a
determinate order." 8
From this point of view, numbers ordinal numbers, that is
stand forth as "a system of ideal objects whose whole content
is exhausted in their mutual relations." In such a system,
Cassirer maintains, the 'what' of the elements is disregarded,
and merely the 'how' of a certain progressive connection is
taken into account. Here, in short, is
a general procedure which is of decisive significance for the whole for-
mation of mathematical concepts. For whenever a system of conditions
is given that can be realized in different contents, then we can hold to
the form of the system itself as invariant, undisturbed by the difference
of contents, and develop its laws deductively. 9
This state of affairs is as clearly evident in geometry as it
is in the science of number. Mathematical space may be defined,
in Leibnizian terminology, as an "order of coexistence." Geo-
metricians may still talk of points, straight lines, and planes 5
but in the course of time these familiar objects have become
divested of all intuitive content, and all connection between
these elements is developed deductively from purely con-
ceptual definitions. The relation expressed by the word 'be-
tween,' for example, though seemingly possessing an irreducible
sensuous connotation, has nevertheless been freed from this
narrow restriction, and is now determined, mathematically,
solely by means of definite logical prescriptions, which alone
endow it with the meaning it possesses in the deductive pro-
cedure of mathematics. In other words, according to Cassirer,
it is always and everywhere "the relational structure as such,"
rather than any absolute properties of the elements entering
into the structure, which constitutes the real 'object' of mathe-
matical investigation. The particular elements entering into
any deductive complex of relations,
are not viewed according to what they are in and for themselves, but
* Substance and Function, 38.
9
248 HAROLD R. SMART
simply as examples of a certain universal form of order and connection;
mathematics . . . recognizes in them no other 'being' than that belonging
to them by participation in this form. For it is only this being that enters
into proof, into the process of inference, and is thus accessible to the full
certainty, that mathematics gives its objects. 10
Thus the fundamental work of the science does not con-
sist, for example, in comparing, dividing, and compounding
specific given magnitudes, but rather "in isolating the generat-
ing relations themselves, upon which all possible determination
of magnitude rests, and in determining the mutual connection
of these relations." Although it may be true, psychologically
speaking, that the meaning of a relation can only be grasped
by means of some given terms which thus serve as its material
basis, still (Cassirer insists) the logical import of the relation
is wholly independent of any such origin, and is the resultant
of a purely rational and deductive procedure. To put the point
in terminology long since familiar to British and American
philosophers, Cassirer apparently concurs in the doctrine that
relations are prior to, and independent of, or 'external* to
their terms.
On the logical plane, therefore, it seems that Cassirer simply
appropriates for his own purposes and construes in his own
fashion that special portion of formal symbolic logic having to
do with relations, in abstraction from other branches of the
subject, towards which, indeed, he manifests, on occasion,
considerable opposition. With respect to this state of affairs the
following points naturally suggest themselves for discussion.
The first of these points, put in the form of a question, is:
What becomes of Kant's doctrine of the categories, in the light
of the significance Cassirer attaches to the calculus of relations?
Partly by explicit statement, partly by plain implication, the
answer is that that doctrine is completely nullified. For, as a
little reflection will suffice to show, it is quite impossible to
reconcile the basic thesis of Kant's transcendental logic that the
categories are functional forms of relationship immanent in
scientific knowledge as embodied in synthetic judgments, with
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 249
the thesis advanced by Cassirer that the "generating relations"
productive of "serial order" are logically prior to, and inde-
pendent of their terms, and purely ideal in nature. This is, in
short, entirely to abandon the Kantian conception of the a priori,
and to revert, instead, to that of Leibniz.
Now it would be a natural though a serious error to assume
that this point concerns only students of Kant and Leibniz, and
that it is without intrinsic importance for anyone who is simply
trying to understand contemporary mathematics. For to follow
Cassirer in this respect is definitely to play into the hands of
those formalists who see in mathematics not a genuine science
among others, but a mere extension and elaboration of formal
logic is to rededicate oneself to that very abstract rationalism
which Kant did so much to overthrow. In fact, it almost seems
as if preoccupation with the sins and omissions of a one-sided
empiricism had induced Cassirer, against his own better judg-
ment, to adopt the opposite extreme, even in the face of Kant's
convincing demonstration that such a one-sided rationalism is
just as untenable.
This interpretation of Cassirer's position gains further con-
firmation by a closer examination of his attitude of acceptance
towards the calculus of relations. In view of his just and pene-
trating criticism of other parts and aspects of the doctrines of the
symbolic logicians (to be touched upon later in this essay), his
exemption of this particular calculus from the force of those
criticisms can only be explained as due to certain inherently
formalistic tendencies in his own thought. That is to say, it is
not, in the last analysis, with abstract formalism in logic and
mathematics as such, but rather merely with certain specific
features and portions of that formalism, that Cassirer finds him-
self in disagreement. Otherwise he would readily perceive, for
example, that, since the calculus of relations is in many essential
respects strictly analogous to the calculus of classes a fact to
which attention is explicitly called by the highest authorities
the charge of circularity which he so acutely brings against this
latter calculus also applies, mutatis mutandis^ to the former. If
the derivation of cardinal numbers from classes be condemned
as circular reasoning, then, for strictly analogous reasons, the
250 HAROLD R. SMART
derivation of ordinal numbers from relations must be circular
also; and if, on the contrary, the latter can be successfully de-
fended against such a charge, then, again for strictly analogous
reasons, so can the former. 11 Since, however, Cassirer simply
contents himself with laying down the general thesis, and no-
where undertakes such an explicit derivation on his own account,
it is impossible to justify this contention further by a critical
study of details.
What still further complicates matters here, and beclouds
the specific issue in question, is the fact that Cassirer envisages
the issue as one ultimately involving a conflict between "the
logic of the generic (or class) concept" and "the logic of the
relational concept." As he sees it, "if the attempt to derive the
concept of number from that of a class were successful, the
traditional form of logic would gain a new source of confirma-
tion. The ordering of individuals into the hierarchy of species
would be, now as before, the true goal of all knowledge. . . ," 12
But surely this antithesis between the two species of concepts
is not as definitive as the preceding statement implies. As good
a historian of science as Cassirer does not need to be told of the
inherently important, if largely subsidiary, role which classifi-
cation as a matter of fact does play, even in such an abstract
science as mathematics. Granting that "the ordering of indi-
viduals into the hierarchy of species" is not the "true goal" of
any science, still it is quite impossible to deny that classification
does represent a most useful and perfectly legitimate scientific
procedure, or that it is explicitly recognized as such by scientists
and logicians. If 'to relate/ in the widest possible sense of the
word, be taken to mean what Kant meant by it, namely, not
merely to establish order in a series, but, more generally, 'to
organize into a system,' then may not a class be construed as a
rudimentary kind of a system, and may not classification itself
be looked upon as a kind of relating? For that matter, no small
part of the business of the very calculus of relations itself con-
sists in classifying relations into a hierarchy, and determining
11 See, on this whole question, the illuminating discussion, in Ch. V, of Lewis
and Langford's Symbolic Logic.
12 Substance and Function^ 53.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 251
the differentiae of the various species and sub-species of re-
lations. Thus little indeed would be left of the calculus, if the
'logic of the generic concept' were to be rejected as entirely
unsound.
In view of such considerations, Cassirer will find many sup-
porters for his strictures on the logic of the generic concept who
will yet not feel inclined to follow him all the way in denying
to it any epistemological value whatsoever and thus leaving the
logic of the relational concept in sole possession of the field.
But for students of Kant there is a still more fundamental con-
sideration which may appropriately be emphasized here.
From a strictly Kantian point of view, as Norman Kemp
Smith well points out, 18 generic and relational concepts, as here
defined, both refer to a distinction, not in the form, but in the
specific content of knowledge. Just as a generic concept (or
universal) expresses a common quality or qualities to be ascribed
to each distinguishable element of a nexus of complex contents,
so a relational concept (or universal) expresses relationships
specified as holding amongst the elements severally. A category,
on the other hand, is not a content of any sort, or any aspect of
a content, but a general form of organization, a "function of
unity," whereby contents are related in the judgment. No
superficial verbal similarity turning upon the common use of the
term 'relation' should be allowed to conceal the fact that Kant
and the symbolic logicians are concerned with two vastly dif-
ferent matters, nor that their basic logical doctrines are ftinda-
mentally opposed in principle. The problems Kant wrestled
with in his transcendental logic are in large part simply ignored
by the symbolic logicians, or handed over to epistemology}
whereas what the symbolic logicians regard as basic logical
problems could scarcely have appeared in that light to Kant.
Precisely in this connection, however, a fundamental episte-
mological antithesis or antinomy appears between the doctrines
of orthodox symbolic logicians and Cassirer's critical idealism.
For precisely at this point certain other Kantian influences make
themselves most strongly felt and give rise both to a criticism of
epistemological theories of the Russellian type, as well as to the
** Commentary to Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, 38, 178.
252 HAROLD R. SMART
application and development of an epistemology on Leibnizian
and Kantian lines. Not only does Cassirer call attention to the
circularity inevitably involved in the attempt to derive cardinal
number from the concept of a class, 14 but he also stoutly insists
quite in the spirit of Kant, and in complete opposition to more
fashionable contemporary tenets on the synthetic character of
mathematical propositions or judgments. In the article already
drawn upon, "Kant und die moderne Mathematik," Cassirer
explains that by synthetic he means, (a) not reducible to that
species of subject-predicate propositions, in which the predicate
merely explicates the meaning of the subject term; (b) not
deducible from the mere formal laws of thought; and (c) the
functional relationship in which mathematical propositions
stand to empirical phenomena, and, lacking which, mathematical
concepts would be nothing better than hollow fictions.
Since points (a) and (b) are now conceded by everyone, their
mere mention seems sufficient here; but point (c) is a different
matter. After the most elaborate epistemological tour de force
by which Russell and his collaborators seek to convince them-
selves and others that, although their absolutely basic "atomic
propositions" admittedly stem directly from sense experience,
nevertheless the world of logic and mathematics, as such, in its
unsullied purity, is a transcendent realm, they can only account
it a "lucky accident," which might just as well have been other-
wise, that the propositions of logic and mathematics apply to the
realm of physical phenomena. In other words, the two realms
having been severed so completely by those thinkers, Cassirer
points out that it is actually an epistemological and logical im-
possibility to establish any real connection between them. As
Cassirer sees it, on the other hand, the objectivity of scientific
knowledge of phenomena is guaranteed precisely by virtue of
the "synthetic unity of the concept" to use an appropriate
Kantian phrase whose sole function is to introduce order
into the ideal 'manifolds' of mathematics, and, through them,
in turn, into the experiential manifolds of the spatio-temporal
world of physics.
* Substance and Function, Ch. II, sec. iiij see also Smart, The Philosophical
Presuppositions of Mathematical Logic, Ch. VI.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 253
Thus, to take a simple example, Cassirer maintains that
thought follows a straight, undeviating path, in proceeding
from the logical calculus of relations, to such a special type of
generating relation as is compactly symbolized by the general
algebraic equation of the second degree, from which, in turn,
every species of conic section circle, ellipse, parabola, etc.
may be deductively derived. And this same mathematical con-
cept of the conic section it is which alone enables the natural
scientist to introduce order or synthetic unity into the manifold
of astronomical phenomena, thus making possible knowledge
of those phenomena which is at once objective and systematic.
Only in this wise, so Cassirer declares in a pregnant passage,
only when we clearly understand that the same basic syntheses upon
which logic and mathematics depend, also control the formation of ex-
periential knowledge, thereby for the first time making it possible to
speak of the ordering of phenomena according to scientific laws and
thus to ascribe objective meaning to these phenomena, is the true justifica-
tion of those principles attained. 15
Nor is this by any means the end of the matter. Not only are
single concepts and judgments thus synthetic, but the whole
process of deduction, characteristic of mathematical inference,
is itself progressive, productive of new knowledge. In this re-
spect also Cassirer opposes the essentially static ideal of logic
and mathematics fostered by the symbolic logicians, in their
thesis that the propositions of these sciences are analytic or
tautological, and also in their complementary doctrine that
deduction is a mere re-arranging of the elements of discourse in
accordance with fixed rules of procedure. Epistemologically
speaking, this doctrine becomes the thesis that thought merely
'discovers' relationships eternally 'there,' subsisting in that
transcendent realm which reveals itself to a critical inspection
to be nothing but the naive hypostatization of certain logical and
mathematical concepts, and their consequent deprivation of any
objective meaning or truth.
Now according to Cassirer this ideal of mathematical knowl-
edge is not only self -contradictory j it directly conflicts with the
15 "Kant und die moderne Mathematik," Kantstudien, vol. XII, 45 (1907).
254 HAROLD R. SMART
plainest possible evidence, namely, the progressive character
which the long history of that science reveals as its most out-
standing feature. Every important advance in mathematics,
from the earliest times down to the immediate present, involves
both an extension and a deepening or enrichment of funda-
mental concepts, and their progressive liberation from what
have conclusively shown themselves to be extraneous sensuous
connotations. "Just as the field of rational numbers is broadened
by gradual steps of thought into the continuous totality of real
numbers, so, by a series of intellectual transformations, does the
space of sense pass into the infinite, continuous, homogeneous
and conceptual space of geometry . . ," 16 illustrative examples
which could be repeated ad nauseam in confirmation of this
view of the continuing 'creative advance' of mathematical
thought.
Hence arises for Cassirer a question which the symbolic logi-
cians, in their blindness, blandly ignore, namely how is this
creative advance possible j how, in epistemological terms, can
it be justified to reason, and how, more precisely, is it to be
described?
In the case of the physical sciences answers to such questions
are comparatively easy to come by, the only difficult logical
problem being that of the closer determination of the nature of
induction. But in common with many, perhaps most contempo-
rary logicians, Cassirer denies a role to induction in the mathe-
matical sciences. True, he apparently does not share the vulgar
prejudice or presupposition dominating the thinking of so many
authorities on this matter, namely, that there is some necessary
connection between induction and specific experimental tech-
niques confined to certain natural sciences, so that it is dog-
matically and arbitrarily settled beforehand that where there is
no experimentation of the sort in question, neither can there be
any induction. Rather Cassirer excludes induction (and an-
alogy!) from mathematical inference, on the ground that,
whereas the former "proceeds from the particular to the uni-
versal . . . [and] attempts to unite hypothetically into a whole
a plurality of individual facts observed as particulars without
" Substance and Function, p. 106.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 255
necessary connection," the latter proceeds always from "the
law of connection," which serves as "the original basis by virtue
of which the individual case can be determined in its meaning."
In other words, "the conditions of the whole system are pre-
determined, and all specialization can only be reached by adding
a new factor as a limiting determination while maintaining these
conditions." 17 In sum, mathematical inference always "proceeds
from the properties of the connection to those of the objects
connected, from the serial principle to the members of the
series," and never in the reverse order.
One minor but nevertheless interesting point included in the
preceding general statement may appropriately be mentioned
here before proceeding to a more detailed study of this concep-
tion of mathematical inference. The symbolic logicians never
tire of proclaiming it as an ideal of their procedure that "all of
pure mathematics" can (or should) be shown to follow de-
ductively from a certain set of primitives primitive or un-
defined ideas, primitive propositions or postulates, and the like.
Nothing not explicitly included or provided for in this founda-
tional nexus is to be permitted entry into the subsequent un-
foldment or 'development' of the series of logico-mathematical
propositions. Otherwise the purely analytical or tautological
nature of those propositions might easily become infected with
a 'synthetic' impurity! Cassirer, on the other hand, realistically
points to the actual practice of mathematicians, and shows con-
clusively that their practice never conforms to any such extrane-
ously imposed ideal. In fact, quite the contrary is the case. Only
by and in so far as modifications and specifications not explicitly
provided for or foreseen in the formulation of the foundational
nexus, but deliberately introduced at certain stages as new facts
or limiting determinations, as the deduction proceeds, can the
special cases or conclusions, in which the procedure character-
istically issues, be derived. To employ the same simple example
utilized earlier in this exposition: from the general equation of
the second degree, the equations of such conies as the ellipse,
the parabola, etc., could never be derived simply by the ana-
lytical 'development' of that equation. On the contrary, such
*lbid. 81, 82.
256 HAROLD R. SMART
special cases can be derived from the general equation only by
introducing limitations not explicitly contemplated in the for-
mulation of that equation, and not formally connected with it in
any way. In this sense they are added from without, somewhat
as the minor premise is added to the major premise in the tra-
ditional syllogism; the only restrictions on this typical deductive
procedure being such as are prescribed by the basic laws of
thought themselves.
This is not, however, the major factor in mathematical de-
duction. It will be recalled that one main epistemological thesis
of Cassirer's critical idealism is that the creative, synthetic ac-
tivity of thought displays itself in the positing or generating
of relations; and, as was indicated above, it is in terms of this
thesis that he construes all scientific reasoning. Thus the prob-
lem of the 'possibility' of mathematics, as one progressive
science among others, may be more definitely characterized as
the problem of determining the rationale, the logical 'go,' so to
speak, of that process in the special field in question.
At this point the Kantian doctrine that mathematical reason-
ing proceeds by means of the 'construction' of its objects, either
in intuition or imagination, reveals its positive significance for
Cassirer. Not that he views the reference to intuition or imagi-
nation as the important factor in that conception; for what
mathematician does not realize that such limitations on his
creative activity have long since been transcended; and does
not Cassirer himself, on every appropriate occasion, proclaim
the liberation of mathematics from reliance on sensuous or per-
ceptual guides as one of the greatest intellectual triumphs of
recent times? Rather what on this view is of permanent worth in
the Kantian doctrine is the emphasis upon construction as a typi-
cal mode of procedure; only the construction must be under-
stood in a purely ideal sense, and as carried out by pure thought,
independently of experience. And here again, as so frequently
happens, Cassirer turns to Leibniz, rather than to Kant, for
further insight, for more positive guidance, in developing his
own ideas. To put it very briefly, it is by means of what Leibniz
called real, causal, or genetic definitions, that, according to Cas-
sirer, the ideal constructions characteristic of mathematical de-
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 257
duction are carried through. Such definitions, which Cassirer
regards as perhaps the most striking exemplification of the pro-
ductivity of thought, serve in effect as rules or laws for the
construction of specific mathematical objects, or complexes of
such objects. For the traditional definition of a circle, for ex-
ample, in terms of genus, species, and differentia, Leibniz would
substitute a definition revealing its "mode of generation," and
similarly for the definition of parallel lines and of all such
mathematical constructs.
No doubt these and the other specimens Leibniz offers of
this type of definition are rather too elementary, too empirical,
to be wholly convincing as samples of purely ideal construc-
tions ; but Cassirer maintains that the principle involved can
easily be generalized in such a way as to bring out its full sig-
nificance. 18 At all events, in presenting his proposed new type of
definition, Cassirer points out that Leibniz envisaged it as an
instrumentality for combatting two erroneous tendencies preva-
lent in the logical theories of his time, tendencies, which, as
Cassirer maintains, still confuse fundamental issues in con-
temporary logic.
The first of these tendencies is nominalism the Hobbesian
doctrine that all definitions are merely nominal. It needs no
citing of names to confirm the fact that this doctrine is enthu-
siastically fostered by many logicians of the present time. And
nominalism in this respect inevitably leads on to the sweeping
conclusion that mathematics in its entirety is nothing but a sym-
bolic technique, a manipulation of conventional symbols, which
as such is devoid of objective import, and in respect to which it is
nonsense to talk of truth. The "freedom" of mathematics is
hereby purchased at the heavy expense of its renunciation of all
claims to yielding knowledge of the real world. Consistency in
the formulation and application of conventional rules of an
empty symbolism is all that remains.
The second erroneous tendency is in a sense antithetical to the
preceding, in that it hypostatizes ideas, endows them with a
lf See the article, "Kant und die moderne Mathematik," and also Leibniz* System
in semen wissenschaftlichen Grundlagen y 108 ff., and Pkilosofhie der symbolischen
Formen, Pt. HI, Ch. IV.
258 HAROLD R. SMART
quasi-ontological status, and attributes to them 'being' in a
transcendent realm quite apart from human experience. On this
view, the sole test of the reality of an idea is its abstract possi-
bility of being thought in complete abstraction from any ques-
tion as to its actual realization in experience, its epistemological
functioning. Adoption of this doctrine commits one to the 'copy'
theory of truth, reduces thought to the role of a passive spec-
tator, and sets up an impassable barrier, a dualism, between the
world of ideas and the factual world between truths of reason
and truths of matter of fact. Finally it should be emphasized
that neither of these tendencies has anything to do with the
actual science of mathematics as such, but is instead the product,
pure and simple, of abstract, gratuitously a priori theorizing.
Thus, according to Leibniz's distinguished commentator and
disciple, these two equally untenable lines of thought, far from
providing a satisfactory foundation for the formation of mathe-
matical concepts, succeed only in setting up an empty scaffolding
of formal consistency and abstract possibility. Through the
instrumentality of the causal or genetic definition, on the other
hand, thought can produce out of its own creative, synthetic
resources, all that is so conspicuously lacking in the rejected
doctrines such at least is Cassirer's profound conviction. To
define the circle to revert to this simple example as a plain
curve, so constituted that it encloses a maximum area within a
given perimeter, is merely a matter of words, which leaves it
doubtful whether there actually be such a curve; and, even in
case this question can be answered affirmatively, it still remains
open to doubt whether the prescribed condition be fulfilled by
just the one sort of curve. Such doubts can be stilled if and only
if a fully determinate "mode of generation" can be specified,
and if the desired characteristics can be shown to be actually
produced by this mode of generation by a rigorous deductive
proof. In this wise, according to Cassirer, the definition may
truly be said to generate the object in question out of its con-
stituent elements. And what is true in this simple case holds
true (so Cassirer maintains) of mathematics generally. Always
and everywhere the necessary and sufficient prerequisite to the
formation of mathematical concepts, and to the ascription to
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 259
them of definite contents, shows itself to be the same. What
Cassirer calls a genetic definition may on occasion (he points
out) find more detailed embodiment in a set of axioms or
postulates, especially where not a specific object but a whole
branch of mathematics multi-dimensional geometry, the
theory of groups is in question. But in any case, the creative
synthesis, involving one or more elementary structural ele-
ments, and producing out of these elements, by means of the
generating relations embodied in the definitional nexus, the
whole contextual content of the field in question, is what char-
acterizes the differentia of mathematical inference as such.
Now it can hardly be denied that Cassirer's criticisms of
fashionable tendencies in contemporary logic such as the nom-
inalistic theory of definitions, the thesis that mathematical pro-
positions are analytical or tautological, and the static concepion
of deduction are well-founded and that his own contrasting
views on these matters are much nearer the truth. His basic
contention, moreover, that mathematics is a progressive science,
sharing with the other sciences the common search for, and at-
tainment of objective knowledge, is one of those truisms which
too many contemporaries, in their over-zealous preoccupation
with symbolic techniques as such, have seemingly lost from
view. The question remains, however, whether, on the basis of
Cassirer's own theory of the formation of mathematical con-
cepts, the 'possibility' of mathematics, in the sense just de-
scribed, can be fully accounted for. As already pointed out, in
spite of his opposition to abstract formalism in certain important
respects, Cassirer nevertheless concurs with such a line of
thought in other equally decisive respects. He concurs, for ex-
ample, in holding that mathematics is nothing but a prolonga-
tion of formal logic, differing only in the somewhat more
restricted range of its assertions $ and also in the widely preva-
lent view that mathematical inference, unlike inference in other
fields, is purely deductive in character. And these two doctrines
imply the strictly a priori character of the propositions in both
logic and mathematics, in the anti-Kantian, rationalistic sense of
that word.
Nevertheless a close study of such a work as Substance and
260 HAROLD R. SMART
Function will reveal highly significant evidence pointing in an-
other direction. So sincere is the author's desire to let the
historical record speak for itself, uncolored by his personal pre-
dilections, that he actually succeeds, to a remarkable degree, in
allowing that record to bear witness directly opposed to all of
those formalistic tenets. Both arithmetic and geometry, he is at
pains to emphasize, developed from humble beginnings in com-
mon sense experience, and both numerical and spatial concepts
were for long encumbered with all sorts of sensuous connota-
tions. In mathematics, quite as in the other sciences, more
general principles had to wait upon the acquisition and analysis
of particular facts; and the more general principles, in turn,
led to the discovery of other particular facts, which, again in
turn, led to the formation of still more general principles such
is the plain historical record, as faithfully presented by Cassirer
himself, there for all who have eyes to read. Yet in every other
science this doubly reciprocal relationship between particulars
and universals is held to exemplify and to depend upon the co-
operative procedures of induction and deduction; and no one
more persuasively than Cassirer himself insists upon the in-
separability of these two aspects of scientific inference in every
other science except mathematics!
Why the exception? Why refuse to designate by the same
name a procedure so obviously the same in every significant
respect; why refuse the name of induction to a procedure in
mathematics which would undoubtedly be called by that name,
if pursued in any other department of human knowledge? Or
why, save for some extraordinarily compelling reason, adhere
to or postulate a theory of mathematical inference which not
only runs counter to the whole history of that special science,
but renders impossible a consistent logical theory of scientific
inference in general? This is surely a question definitely de-
manding an answer; a question that only stares one the more
fully in the face the more persistently it is ignored by the vast
majority of logicians. Every logician construes reasoning by
analogy as an essential and characteristic instrument of inductive
generalization; histories of mathematics are full of examples
of reasoning by analogy; yet the obvious conclusion is not
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 261
drawn. New mathematical theories are evolved to embrace and
systematize under a set of common principles various particular
theorems and topics hitherto regarded as unrelated or inde-
pendent so Cassirer, like every other historian, repeatedly
points out. Precisely the same result attained in any other science
would be held up as a typical product of inductive reasoning}
yet in the special case of mathematics no one seems to be willing
to conceive that it could possibly call for a modification of the
hallowed doctrine that mathematical inference is purely deduc-
tive. Could any more conspicuous example of Bacon's "Idols
of the Tribe" easily be found? And observe well! it is, in the
last analysis, precisely and solely because of the uncritical ac-
ceptance of this doctrine that certain puzzling (not to say in-
soluble) epistemological problems with regard to the nature
and import of mathematical knowledge rise up to plague so
many contemporary logicians.
It would be grossly unfair, of course, to criticize Cassirer
alone in this connection; the point is, rather, that by his clear
presentation of the historical evidence he supplies all the requi-
site material to overthrow that prevalent but one-sided theory
of mathematical inference, which is actually merely the conse-
quence of unjustified epistemological presuppositions, and
which so blindly ignores such abundant and conclusive evidence
to the contrary.
What these presuppositions are, and that they are indeed un-
justifiedj it will not, perhaps, be too difficult to discover, once
attention is turned in their direction. At bottom, it will be found,
there is little save verbal terminology, and sometimes scarcely
even that, to distinguish Cassirer's critical idealism from lines
of thought he vigorously opposes, so far as this important matter
is concerned.
Who, for example, is the author of the assertion that "the
mathematician need not concern himself with the particular
being or intrinsic nature of his points, lines, and planes, ... ;"
on the contrary, a 'point' merely "has to be something that satis-
fies our axioms?" Not Cassirer, though (as noted above) he says
the same thing in other words, but Bertrand Russell. 19 And who
19 Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy -, 59.
262 HAROLD R. SMART
declares that in mathematics "a field of free and universal
activity is disclosed, in which thought transcends all limits of
the 'given'," in that "the objects which we consider . . . have
only an ideal being?" Not Bertrand Russell, but Cassirer. 20
True, according to Russell thought merely discovers the sub-
sisting essences of this ideal, trans-empirical realm $ whereas
according to Cassirer thought actively creates those universals,
thus generating its own world out of its own internal resources.
Nevertheless both thinkers emphasize equally the complete
"liberation" of thought from all experientially imposed limita-
tions. 21
The fact that Cassirer presents such a telling criticism of
Russellian epistemology, in this regard, cannot be allowed to
obscure the complementary fact that precisely analogous ob-
jections may be urged against his own epistemology. Surely
'discovery' is no more a pure metaphor, as applied to the role
of thought in knowledge, than is 'creation.' 22 In plain language,
the relation of mathematics to logic is equally close, and the
separation of mathematical concepts from experience is equally
complete, whichever metaphor may be used to characterize the
actual functioning of thought. On no other grounds can it be
explained why Cassirer explicitly recognizes that he as well as
Russell has to show how mathematical concepts, originally con-
strued as non-experiential and purely logical in origin, can yet
be 'applied' so directly and effectively to the solution of em-
pirical problems. To insist upon the inseparability of mathemat-
ics and formal logic is ipso facto to cut mathematics off from
all essential connection with experience} and to insist, with
Cassirer, that nevertheless mathematical knowledge is as ob-
jective as all other scientific knowledge, because, forsooth, all
truth is literally created by thinking, is if so jacto to reduce
scientific truth as such to formal consistency within a closed
80 Substance and Function, 112.
81 The hostile critic would be tempted to express the same idea in rather different
terms, to the effect that the "liberation" in question actually amounts to a confine-
ment of thought within the four walls of an a priori formalism.
M Cf. the present writer's The Philosophical Presuppositions of Mathematical
Logic Chs. Ill VI, on this point, and also for a remarkable similarity between
the views of Josiah Royce and Cassirer on such matters.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 263
circle of ideas the whole world, in Schopenhauerian language,
is my idea and objectivity (as Russell has somewhere justly
observed) must be construed, in the last analysis, as merely a
species of subjectivity.
There is, however, here as in other contexts, another tend-
ency, or another phase of Cassirer's thought, which sharply
conflicts with such abstract rationalism. For above everything
else he insists on the essential continuity of scientific thought
in general, and of mathematical thought in particular. And,
although carrying on a persistent warfare against all species of
empiricism and positivism, he at the same time emphatically
maintains that it is the prime function of scientific laws and
general mathematical formulas alike to render the 'particulars'
particular scientific facts, or specific mathematical truths
intelligible, by incorporating them in a concrete systematic
nexus. Apart from such a nexus, he insists, neither particulars
nor universals have any meaning. Even in the case of mathe-
matics, he seems to argue, the construction of concepts does not
take place in complete abstraction from perceptually given and
intuitively apprehended data, though it does of course involve,
from the very beginning, an attempt to free those concepts more
and more, not from their roots in experience as such, but rather
simply from irrelevant, transitory, and merely sensuous con-
notations. 23 The historical accuracy of this contention cannot be
denied, and neither can its epistemological significance be over-
emphasized.
The point is that in mathematics, just as in all other sciences,
new concepts and new theories are evolved in the process of
seeking a solution to some hitherto recalcitrant problem in-
herited from an earlier stage in the development of the science.
These new concepts and theories usually represent the end
product of a long and arduous labor of preparation, of trial
and error; and their significance is measured, not merely by
reference to the particular problem or problems they solve, but
also in terms of the enrichment of meaning they bestow upon
previously accepted concepts and theories. As Cassirer so well
says,
" Philosofhie der symbolischen Formen y III, 45 iff., esp. 468f.
264 HAROLD R. SMART
the unity and self-sufficiency of the mathematical method depends upon
the fact that the creative, generative procedure to which the science
owes its origin, never comes to an end at any given point, but displays
itself in ever new forms, and in this wise maintains itself forever as one
and the same, as an indestructible totality. 24
What is of decisive significance here is that within the science
of mathematics itself (quite as in every other science) there is,
on such a view, what may be called an immanent logic, which
carries the science forward on its own momentum. The history
of mathematics in its entirety is nothing less than a standing
repudiation of any and all attempts to 'deduce' its fundamental
concepts and theories from any fixed and arbitrary set of formal
postulates and definitions. For that matter logical principles,
as such, differ absolutely, both in nature and function, from the
premises or other foundations of any given science such at
least is one lesson plainly taught by the transcendental logic of
Kant. And on the other hand, the only logic mathematics (or
any other science) needs or uses, in the course of its own pro-
gressive development, resides in those logical principles accord-
ing to which, but not from which, mathematical reasoning pro-
ceeds. In the very nature of the case, the foundations of no
science are properly to be described as logical} for the good and
sufficient reason that it is their proper function to define or
determine (and this means progressively to redefine), not the
method, but the general nature of the content, the subject-
matter, of the science in question. If it be true, as everyone
acknowledges it to be, that the elementary content of mathe-
matics was supplied by, or taken from crude experience, then it
is equally true and undeniable that the whole history of the
science must logically be regarded as an account of the precise
way in which that first crude material has been (as Cassirer is
fond of repeating) elaborated, refined, enriched in meaning,
and increased in extent. It cannot be too strongly emphasized
that an enormous burden of proof rests upon the shoulders of
anyone trying to maintain any other thesis proof which would
not only have to disregard all the historical evidence, but run
directly counter to it.
* Of. cit., 469.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 265
Thus it is only as an inevitable consequence of the quixotic
endeavor to base mathematics on formal logic, that the self-
stultifying thesis that the science has absolutely no content can
be understood, and that the insoluble problem of the 'applica-
tion' of mathematical concepts rises up to plague both scientists
and philosophers. On the view clearly implicit in Cassirer's
emphasis on the continuity and progressive character of mathe-
matical knowledge, on the other hand, no such artificial prob-
lems can arise, for the good and sufficient reason that on that
view mathematics has never entirely lost contact with experi-
ence.
What, then, it may be asked, is the true import of the dictum
proclaimed by Cassirer himself, along with so many other
authorities, that no other meaning is to be ascribed to any
mathematical concept (even to such as seem most empirical,
such as the solids of geometry), than that contained in and pre-
scribed by the basic postulates and definitions? Does not this
fundamental methodological principle render any reference
to experience logically inoperative and purely incidental? No
matter what the whole previous history of mathematics says or
implies, who can deny that such is the state of affairs at the
present time?
But surely the answers to these questions are not far to seek.
The phrase 'no other meaning than that prescribed by the basic
postulates' means just what it says; and it does not say that no
meaning whatsoever is to be ascribed to such basic concepts and
propositions. For that matter, precisely the same assertion, mu-
tatis mutandis, may be made concerning the basic concepts and
definitions of any science biology, for example 5 for pre-
cisely herein lies the only justification for calling them 'basic.'
That such an assertion lends itself to misinterpretation to the
effect that 'no other meaning' means 'no meaning at all' has,
however, unfortunately revealed itself to be the case. It is true,
of course, that the only experience immediately and directly
relevant to mathematics at any given stage is the highly ab-
stract experience represented, in the main, by what the next
preceding stage of the science has made of space, number, and
the like; just as, in physics, the only directly relevant experience
266 HAROLD R. SMART
is what the next preceding stage of that science has made of
space-time, the constitution of the atom, and the like. No de-
veloped science ever falls back upon the crude experience of the
c plain man/ for the purpose of verifying or testing its concepts
and theories} comparatively rarely does it do so, indeed, even
in the most elementary laboratory work of the undergraduate.
In all cases the experience really in question is that which both
insures the continuity of scientific knowledge and provides the
material essential for further progress. It goes without saying
that experience, in such contexts, is restricted to what is relevant
to the science in question j and, just as the mathematician ab-
stracts from all or most of the physical properties, attributes,
and relations of things, so the physicist abstracts from all of the
properties, attributes, and relations of things, other than such as
logically come within his purview as a physicist. 25 But just as
physics yields genuine knowledge of the real world only because
it does not abstract from all properties, attributes, and relations,
precisely the same is true, mutatis mutandis, of mathematics
a fact which disposes of all those problems concerning the appli-
cation of mathematics to experience, as neither the theories of
Russell nor even those of Cassirer himself are able to do. More-
over, it is only because, and to the extent that this is so, as Kant
plainly intimated, that its 'possibility' as a science can be under-
stood. What Cassirer says so well of mathematical symbols,
namely that they are neither meaningless signs, as some would
argue, no mundane instrumentalities for communication with a
transcendent realm of hypostatized ideas, as others suggest, but
are rather explicative of meanings immanent in mathematical
thought, is directly to the point in this connection. And for this
very reason, if for no others, a calculus of relations, conceived
as a branch of formal symbolic logic, is just as impotent, and for
strictly analogous reasons, as the so-called subject-predicate
logic, with respect to the generation of the synthetic concepts
and judgments of mathematics.
In the light of the preceding discussion it would seem that
much the same observation applies to Cassirer's theory of math-
* See the present writer's article entitled "Cassirer versus Russell," in Philosophy
of Science, Vol. X., no. 3 (July, 1943), 174.
THEORY OF MATHEMATICAL CONCEPTS 267
ematical concepts, with respect to its relation to contemporary
symbolic logic, that commentators apply to Kant's transcen-
dental logic, with respect to its relation to traditional formal
logic. That is to say, it is rather in spite of misleading associa-
tions and entanglements with abstract formalism than because
of any positive guidance accruing from such a source, that Cas-
sirer, like Kant before him, has accomplished so much of solid
and enduring worth.
HAROLD R. SMART
SAGE SCHOOL OF PHILOSOPHY
CORNELL UNIVERSITY
7
Kurt Lemn
CASSIRER'S PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE AND
THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
CASSIRER'S PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE AND
THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
following remarks 1 on the relation between Cassirer's
JJL views on the development of science and the recent history
of psychology are the expression of a person who has always
felt the deep gratitude of a student to his teacher.
During the period from 1910, when, as a graduate student,
I listened to the lectures of the then "Privatdocent" Cassirer,
to 1946, psychology has undergone a series of major changes
related to basic issues of Behaviorism, Gestalt psychology, Psy-
choanalysis, Field Theory and the present problem of an in-
tegrated social science. The experiment has reached out from
"psycho-physics" into any number of areas including motiva-
tion, personality > and social psychology. The mathematical
problems of representing psychological fields and treating data
statistically have proceeded step by step to new levels. Tech-
niques of interviewing, observation, and other forms of fact-
finding have grown into a rich and well-established method-
ology. The scientific infant of 1910, which had hardly cut his
cord to mother philosophy and was looking with astonished eyes
and an uneasy heart to the grown-up sciences, not knowing
whether he should try to copy them or whether he ought to
follow his own line this scientific infant has perhaps not yet
fully developed into maturity, but has certainly reached a stage
of strength and progress which makes the psychologies of 1910
and 1946 rather different entities. Still, throughout this period,
scarcely a year passed when I did not have specific reason to
1 Some sections of this paper are also published in Lewin, Kurt, "Problems of
Group Dynamics and the Integration of the Social Sciences: I. Social Equilibria."
Human Relations (1947) Vol. I.
271
272 KURT LEWIN
acknowledge the help which Cassirer's views on the nature of
science and research offered.
The value of Cassirer's philosophy for psychology lies, I feel,
less in his treatment of specific problems of psychology al-
though his contribution in this field and particularly his recent
contributions are of great interest than in his analysis of the
methodology and concept-formation of the natural sciences.
To me these decades of rapid scientific growth of psychology
and of the social sciences in general have provided test after
test for the correctness of most of the ideas on science and scien-
tific development expressed in his Substanzbegrif und Funk-
tionsbegriff. Since the primitive discussions of the psychologists
of 1910 about whether or not psychology ought to try to include
not only qualitative but also quantitative data, and Cassirer's
general discussions of the problem of quality and quantity up
to the present problems of research in personality, such as the
treatment of biographical data, and Cassirer's discussion of the
interdependence of "historical" and "systematic" problems ,
I have felt with increasing strength the power and productivity
of his basic approach to science.
It is not easy to point in Cassirer's work to a specific concept
or any specific statement which provides a striking new insight
and solves a previously insoluble problem. Still, as "participant
observer" of the recent history of psychology, I may be per-
mitted to state that Cassirer's approach seems to me a most
illuminating and constructive help for making those decisions
about methods and about the direction of the next step, upon
which it depends whether a concrete piece of research will be a
substantial contribution to a living science or a well polished
container of nothing.
i. THEORY OF SCIENCE AND EMPIRICAL RESEARCH
The relation between logic and theory of science on the one
hand and the progress of empirical science on the other is not
a simple one and is not easily transformed into a mutually pro-
ductive state of affairs.
Since Kant philosophers have tried more or less successfully
to avoid telling the empirical scientist what he "ought" to do or
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 273
not to do. They have learned, with a few exceptions, to regard
science as an object they should study rather than rule. This
laudable and necessary removal of philosophy from the authori-
tarian place of the boss or the judge over science has led to a
tendency of eliminating all "practical" relations between phi-
losophy and the empirical sciences, including the perhaps pos-
sible and fruitful position of philosophy as a consultant to
science. As the scientist tries to progress into the eternal frontier
of the unknown, he faces highly complex and intricate problems
of methods, concepts, and theory formation. It would seem
natural that he should turn to the philosophical study of the
nature of science for information and help on the method-
ological and conceptual aspects of the pressing problems he is
trying to solve.
There are certain lines along which such help might be forth-
coming and certain dangers involved in the all around co-
operation of scientists and philosophers on the theory and prac-
tice of such an "applied theory of science." To start with the
latter: as a rule, the philosopher can hardly be expected to have
the detailed knowledge of an active research worker in a specific
branch of an empirical science. As a rule, therefore, he should
not be expected to make direct contributions to empirical
theories. The tragi-comic happening of half a decade ago, when
a certain group of philosophers tried to revive good old classical
behaviorism just after it had fulfilled its usefulness for psy-
chology and was happily dying, should be a warning against
such inappropriate overstepping of boundaries. On the other
hand, such danger should not minimize the essential advantages
which a closer cooperation between the philosopher and the
scientist should offer to both.
As far as I can see, there are two main lines along which
valuable and more than accidental help for the empirical and
particularly the social sciences may emerge from a closer rela-
tion to philosophy. One has to do with mathematical logic, the
other with comparative theory of science.
The development of mathematical logic has proceeded con-
siderably beyond what Cassirer had to offer. Mathematical logic
seems to provide a fruitful possibility of assistance for specific
274 KURT LEWIN
problems of measurement for basic mathematical questions re-
garding qualitative and quantitative data, for general mathema-
tical problems of representing social and psychological fields,
and so on. The insight provided by mathematical logic could
probably have avoided some of the past headaches and should
be of considerable potential assistance to the social scientist in the
coming period of the quantitative measurement of social forces.
Mathematical logic has, however, not been of much avail
and, in my judgment, is not likely to be of much avail for
guiding the psychologist or social scientist through certain other
major methodological perplexities.
The logician is accustomed to deal with problems of correct
conclusions or other aspects of science and concepts which are
"timeless," which hold as much for the physics of Copernicus as
for modern physics. These problems are doubtless of great
interest to the research-worker. They make up, however, only
a small section of the problems of scientific strategy which are
the concern of the daily struggle of progressing into the un-
known. The main problems, which the scientist has to face and
for which he has to find a solution, are inevitably bound to the
particular state of development of his science, even if they are
problems of method rather than content.
It is unrealistic and unproductive for an empirical scientist to
approach problems of scientific method and procedure in a way
which does not take cognizance of the basic fact that, to be
effective, scientific methods have to be adjusted to the specific
state of affairs at a given time. This holds for the techniques
of fact-finding, for the process of conceptualization and theoriz-
ing, in short, for more or less all aspects of research. Research
is the art of taking the next step. Methods and concepts, which
may represent a revolutionary progress today, may be outmoded
tomorrow. Can the philosopher gain insight into the develop-
ment of science in a way useful for these vital time-bound
aspects of scientific labor?
The logician may be inclined to place these problems outside
the realm of a theory of science. He may be inclined to view
them not as philosophical problems but as questions which
should be dealt with by historians. Doubtless the researcher is
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 275
deeply influenced by the culture in which he lives and by its
technical and economic facilities. Not these problems of cultural
history, however, are in question when the social psychologist
has to make up his mind whether or not "experiments with
groups" are scientifically meaningful, or what procedure he may
follow for developing better concepts of personality, of leader-
ship, or of other aspects of group life. Not historical, but con-
ceptual and methodological problems are to be answered, ques-
tions about what is scientifically right or wrong, adequate or
inadequate 5 although this correctness may be specific to a special
developmental stage of a science and may not hold for a pre-
vious or a later stage. In other words, the term "scientific de-
velopment" refers to levels of scientific maturity, to levels of
concepts and theories in the sense of philosophy rather than of
human history or psychology.
It is this approach to science as emerging systems of theorems
and concepts to which Cassirer has contributed so much. When-
ever Cassirer discusses science, he seems to perceive both the
permanent characteristics of scientific systems and procedures
and the specific conceptual form.
Philosophy of science can come to an insight into the nature
of science only by studying science. It is, therefore, in permanent
danger of making the science of the past a prototype for all
science and of making past methodology the standard by which
to measure what scientific methods "ought" to be used or not
to be used. Cassirer has in most cases successfully avoided this
danger by looking at the scientific mehods of the past in the way
in which the research-worker at that time would perceive them.
He discloses the basic character of science as the eternal attempt
to go beyond what is regarded scientifically accessible at any
specific time. To proceed beyond the limitations of a given level
of knowledge the researcher, as a rule, has to break down
methodological taboos which condemn as "unscientific" or "il-
logical" the very methods or concepts which later on prove to
be basic for the next major progress. Cassirer has shown how
this step by step revolution of what is "scientifically permis-
sible" dominates the development of mathematics, physics, and
chemistry throughout their history.
276 KURT LEWIN
A second reason why I feel Cassirer's approach is so valuable
to the social scientist is his comparative procedure. Although
Cassirer has not fully developed what might be called a system-
atic comparative theory of the sciences, he took important steps
in this direction. His treatment of mathematics, physics, and
chemistry, of historical and systematic disciplines is essentially
of a comparative nature. Cassirer shows an unusual ability to
blend the analysis of general characteristics of scientific method-
ology with the analysis of a specific branch of science. It is this
ability to reveal the general rule in an example, without de-
stroying the specific characteristics of a particular discipline at a
given stage of development, which makes the comparative treat-
ment of some branches of mathematics and of the natural
sciences so illuminating for research in the social sciences. This
comparative approach opens the way to a perception of similari-
ties between different sciences and between apparently un-
related questions within the same science.
We shall discuss here only one type of problem as an example
of the structural similarities between the conceptual problems
of the present social sciences and problems of mathematics and
the physical sciences at certain stages of development, namely
that of "existence."
2. THE PROBLEM OF "EXISTENCE" IN AN EMPIRICAL SCIENCE
Arguments about "existence" may seem metaphysical in
nature and may therefore not be expected to be raised in
empirical sciences. Actually, however, opinions about existence
or non-existence are quite common in the empirical sciences and
have greatly influenced scientific development in both a positive
and a negative way. Labelling something as "non-existing" is
equivalent to declaring it "out of bounds" for the scientist.
Attributing "existence" to an item automatically makes it a duty
of the scientist to consider this item as an object of research; it
includes the necessity of considering its properties as "facts,"
which cannot be neglected in the total system of theories j
finally, it implies that the terms by which one refers to the item
are accepted as scientific "concepts" (rather than regarded as
"mere words").
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 277
The problem of "existence" is, therefore, one of the most
illuminating examples for the way in which facts, concepts, and
methods are closely interdependent aspects of an empirical
science. To demonstrate the way in which this interdependence
is functioning in every phase of science is the central theme of
this aspect of Cassirer's philosophy.
Cassirer follows the steps by which mathematics is gradually
transformed. Geometry and the theory of numbers, for instance,
changes from a study of separate forms or entities, which are to
be described and analysed one by one with the objective of
finding "permanent properties" into a discipline which deals
with problems of interrelations and transformations. 2
Geometry, as the theory of invariants, treats certain unchangeable rela-
tions; but this unchangeableness cannot be defined unless we understand,
as its conceptual background, certain fundamental changes relative to
which they hold. The unchanging geometrical properties are not such
in and for themselves, but only in relation to a system of possible trans-
formations that we implicitly assume. Constancy and change thus appear
as thoroughly correlative moments, definable only through each other. 3
In physics an equivalent change occurs on the basis of an
increasingly close interdependence of fact finding and theory.
It has been shown, in opposition to the traditional logical doctrine, that
the course of the mathematical construction of concepts is defined by the
procedures of the construction of series. We have not been concerned
with separating out the common element from a plurality of similar im-
pressions but with establishing a principle by which their diversity should
appear. The unity of the concept has not been found in a fixed group of
properties, but in the rule, which represents the mere diversity as a
sequence of elements according to law. 4
In truth, no physicist experiments and measures with the particular
instrument that he has sensibly before his eyes; but he substitutes for it
an ideal instrument in thought, from which all accidental defects, such
as necessarily belong to the particular instrument, are excluded. For
example, if we measure the intensity of an electric current by a tangent-
compass, then the observations, which we make first with a concrete
a Substance and Function (Swabcy tr.) , 68.
* Ibid., 90$ wording changed by K. Lewin, in line with German original.
4 Ibid., 148.
278 KURT LEWIN
apparatus, must be related and carried over to a- general geometrical
model, before they are physically applicable. We substitute for a coppei
wire of a definite strength a strictly geometrical circle without breadth ;
in place of the steel of the magnetic needle, which has a certain magni-
tude and form, we substitute an infinitely small, horizontal magnetic
axis, which can be moved without friction around a vertical axis; and
it is the totality of these transformations, which permits us to carry the
observed deflection of the magnetic needle into the general theoretical
formula of the strength of the current, and thus to determine the value
of the latter. The corrections, which we make and must necessarily make
with the use of every physical instrument, are themselves a work of
mathematical theory; to exclude these latter, is to deprive the observation
itself of its meaning and value. 5
Until relatively recently psychology, sociology, and anthro-
pology were dominated by a methodology which regarded
science as a process of "collecting facts." This methodology
showed all the earmarks of early Greek mathematics and pre-
Galilean physics. During the last ten years the hostility to
theorizing has greatly diminished. It has been replaced by a
relatively wide-spread recognition of the necessity for develop-
ing better concepts and higher levels of theory.
This change has its corollary in certain changes regarding
what is considered "existing." Beliefs regarding "existence" in
social science have changed in regard to the degree to which
"full reality" is attributed to psychological and social phenom-
ena, and in regard to the reality of their "deeper," dynamic
properties.
At the beginning of this century, for instance, the experi-
mental psychology of "will and emotion" had to fight for rec-
ognition against a prevalent attitude which placed volition,
emotion, and sentiments in the "poetic realm" of beautiful
words, a realm to which nothing corresponds which could be
regarded as "existing" in the sense in which the scientist uses
the term. Although every psychologist had to deal with these
facts realistically in his private life, they were banned from the
realm of "facts" in the scientific sense. Emotions were declared
'/*., 144.
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 279
to be something too "fluid" and "intangible" to be pinned down
by scientific analysis or by experimental procedures. Such a
methodological argument does not deny existence to the phe-
nomenon, but it has the effect of keeping the topic outside the
realm of empirical science.
Like social taboos, a scientific taboo is kept up not so much by
a rational argument as by a common attitude among scientists:
any member of the scientific guild who does not strictly adhere
to the taboo is looked upon as queer j he is suspected of not
adhering to the scientific standards of critical thinking.
3. THE REALITY OF SOCIAL PHENOMENA
Before the invention of the atom bomb the average physical
scientist was hardly ready to concede to social phenomena the
same degree of "reality" as to a physical object. Hiroshima and
Nagasaki seem to have caused many physical scientists to change
their minds. This change was hardly based on philosophical con-
siderations. The bomb has driven home with dramatic intensity
the degree to which social happenings are both the result of
and the conditions for the occurrence of physical events. The
period during which the natural scientist thought of the social
scientist as someone interested in dreams and words (rather
than as an investigator of facts which are not less real than
physical facts and which can be studied no less objectively) has
gradually been coming to an end.
The social scientists themselves, of course, have had a
stronger belief in the "reality" of the entities they were study-
ing. Still this belief was frequently limited to the specific narrow
section with which they happened to be familiar. The economist,
for instance, finds it a bit difficult to concede to psychological,
to anthropological, or to legal data that degree of reality which
he gives to prices and other economic data. Some psychologists
still view with suspicion the reality of those cultural facts with
which the anthropologist is concerned. They tend to regard only
individuals as real and they are not inclined to consider a
"group atmosphere" as something which is as real and measur-
able as, let us say, a physical field of gravity. Concepts like that
a8o KURT LEWIN
of "leadership" retained a halo of mysticism even after it had
been demonstrated that it is quite possible to measure and not
only to "judge" leadership performance.
The denial of existence of a group or of certain aspects of
group life is based on arguments which grant existence only to
units of certain size, or which concern methodologic-technical
problems, or conceptual problems.
4. REALITY AND SIZE
Cassirer 6 discusses how, periodically throughout the history
of physics, vivid discussions have occurred about the reality of
the atom, the electron, or whatever else was considered at that
time to be the smallest particle of physical material. In the social
sciences it has usually been not the part but the whole whose
existence has been doubted.
Logically, there is no reason for distinguishing between the
reality of a molecule, an atom, or an ion, or more generally
between the reality of a whole or its parts. There is no more
magic behind the fact that groups have properties of their own,
which are different from the properties of their subgroups or
their individuals members, than behind the fact that molecules
have properties, which are different from the properties of the
atoms or ions of which they are composed.
In the social as in the physical field the structural properties
of a dynamic whole are different from the structural properties
of their subparts. Both sets of properties have to be investigated.
When one and when the other is most important, depends upon
the question to be answered. But there is no difference of reality
between them.
If this basic statement is accepted, the problem of existence
of a group loses its metaphysical flavor. Instead we face a series
of empirical problems. They are equivalent to the chemical
question of whether a given aggregate is a mixture of different
types of atoms, or whether these atoms have formed molecules
of a certain type. The answer to such a question has to be
given in chemistry, as in the social sciences, on the basis of an
f Ibid., 151-170.
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 281
empirical probing into certain testable properties of the case in
hand.
For instance, it may be wrong to state that the blond women
living in a town "exist as a group" in the sense of being a dy-
namic whole that is characterized by a close interdependence of
their members. They are merely a number of individuals who
are "classified under one concept" according to the similarity of
one of their properties. If, however, the blond members of a
workshop are made an "artificial minority" and are discrim-
inated against by their colleagues, they may well become a
group with specific structural properties.
Structural properties are characterized by relations between
parts rather than by the parts or elements themselves. Cassirer
emphasizes that, throughout the history of mathematics and
physics, from Anaxagoras and Aristotle to Bacon, Boscovich,
Boltzman and the present day, problems of constancy of rela-
tions rather than of constancy of elements have gained im-
portance and have gradually changed the picture of what is
considered essential.
The meaning of the mathematical concept cannot be comprehended,
as long as we seek any sort of presentational correlate for it in the given ;
the meaning only appears when we recognize the concept as the expres-
sion of a $ure relation, upon which rests the unity and continuous con-
nection of the members of a manifold. The function of the physical
concept also is first evident in this interpretation. The more it disclaims
every independent perceptible content and everything pictorial, the
more clearly its logical and systematic function is shown. . . . All that the
"thing" of the popular view of the world loses in properties, it gains
in relations; for it no longer remains isolated and dependent on itself
alone, but is connected inseparably by logical threads with the totality
of experience. Each particular concept is, as it were, one of these threads,
on which we string real experiences and connect them with future possi-
ble experiences. The objects of physics: matter and force, atom and
ether, can no longer be misunderstood as so many new realities for in-
vestigation, and realities whose inner essence is to be penetrated when
once they are recognized as instruments produced by thought for the
purpose of comprehending the confusion of phenomena as an ordered
and measurable whole/
'Ibid., 1 66.
282 KURT LEWIN
5. REALITY, METHODS, AND EXPERIENCE
If recognition o the existence of an entity depends upon
this entity's showing properties or constancies of its own, the
judgment about what is real or unreal should be affected by
changes in the possibility of demonstrating social properties.
The social sciences have considerably improved their tech-
niques for reliably recording the structure of small or large
groups and of registering the various aspects of group life.
Sociometric techniques, group observation, interview techniques,
and others are enabling the social scientist more and more to
gather reliable data on the structural properties of groups, on
the relations between groups or subgroups, and on the relation
between a group and the life of its individual members.
The taboo against believing in the existence of a social entity
is probably most effectively broken by handling this entity
experimentally. As long as the scientist merely describes a lead-
ership form, he is open to the criticism that the categories used
reflect merely his "subjective views" and do not correspond to
the "real" properties of the phenomena under consideration. If
the scientist experiments with leadership and varies its form,
he relies on an "operational definition" which links the concept
of a leadership form to concrete procedures of creating such a
leadership form or to the procedures for testing its existence.
The "reality" of that to which the concept refers is established
by "doing with" rather than "looking at," and this reality is
independent of certain "subjective" elements of classification.
The progress of physics from Archimedes to Einstein shows
consecutive steps, by v^hich the "practical" aspect of the ex-
perimental procedure has modified and sometimes revolution-
ized the scientific concepts regarding the physical world by
changing the beliefs of the scientists about what is and what is
not real.
To vary a social phenomenon experimentally the experi-
menter has to take hold of all essential factors, even if he is
not yet able to analyze them satisfactorily. A major omission
or misjudgment on this point makes the experiment fail. In
social research the experimenter has to take into consideration
such factors as the personality of individual members, the group
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 283
structure, ideology and cultural values, and economic factors.
Group experimentation is a form of social management. To be
successful it, like social management, has to take into account
all of the various factors that happen to be important for the
case in hand. Experimentation with groups will therefore lead
to a natural integration of the social sciences, and it will force
the social scientist to recognize as reality the totality of factors
which determine group life.
6. SOCIAL REALITY AND CONCEPTS
It seems that the social scientist has a better chance of accom-
plishing such a realistic integration than the social practitioner.
For thousands of years kings, priests, politicians, educators, pro-
ducers, fathers and mothers in fact, all individuals have
been trying day by day to influence smaller or larger groups.
One might assume that this would have led to accumulated
wisdom of a well integrated nature. Unfortunately nothing is
farther from the truth. We know that our average diplomat
thinks in very one-sided terms, perhaps those of law, or eco-
nomics, or military strategy. We know that the average manu-
facturer holds highly distorted views about what makes a
work-team tick. We know that no one can answer today even
such relatively simple questions as what determines the pro-
ductivity of a committee meeting.
Several factors have come together to prevent practical ex-
perience from leading to clear insight. Certainly, the man of
affairs is convinced of the reality of group life, but he is usually
opposed to a conceptual analysis. He prefers to think in terms
of "intuition" and "intangibles." The able practitioner fre-
quently insists that it is impossible to formulate simple, clear
rules about how to reach a social objective. He insists that
different actions have to be taken according to the various situa-
tions, that plans have to be highly flexible and sensitive to the
changing scene.
If one tries to transform these sentiments into scientific lan-
guage, they amount to the following statements, a) Social
events depend on the social field as a whole, rather than on a
few selected items. This is the basic insight behind the field
284 KURT LEWIN
theoretical method which has been successful in physics, which
has steadily grown in psychology and, in my opinion, is bound
to be equally fundamental for the study of social fields, simply
because it expresses certain basic general characteristics of inter-
dependence, b) The denial of "simple rules" is partly identical
with the following important principle of scientific analysis.
Science tries to link certain observable (phenotypical) data with
other observable data. It is crucial for all problems of inter-
dependence, however, that for reasons which we do not need
to discuss here it is, as a rule, impracticable to link one set of
phenotypical data directly to other phenotypical data. Instead,
it is necessary to insert "intervening variables." 8 To use a more
common language: the practitioner as well as the scientist views
the observable data as mere "symptoms." They are "surface"
indications of some "deeper-lying" facts. He has learned to
"read" the symptoms, like a physicist reads his instruments.
The equations which express physical laws refer to such deeper-
lying dynamic entities as pressure, energy, or temperature
rather than to the directly observable symptoms such as the
movements of the pointer of an instrument.
The underlying methodological principle is but one expres-
sion of the nature of the relation between concepts, scientific
facts and scientific fact finding. In the words of Cassirer,
Strictly speaking, the experiment never concerns the real case, as it lies
before us here and now in all the wealth of its particular determinations,
but the experiment rather concerns an ideal case, which we substitute
for it. The real beginnings of scientific induction furnish the classical
example of this. Galileo did not discover the law of falling bodies by
collecting arbitrary observations of sensuously real bodies, but by de-
fining hypothetically the concept of uniform acceleration and taking it as
a conceptual measure of the facts. This concept provides for the given
time-values a series of space-values, such as proceed according to a
fixed rule, that can be grasped once for all. Henceforth we must at-
tempt to advance to the actual process of reality by a progressive con-
sideration of the complex determinations, that were originally excluded:
as, for example, the variation of acceleration according to the distance
from the centre of the earth, retardation by the resistance of the air, etc. 9
'Tolman, E. C, "The Determiners of Behavior at a Choice Point," Psycho-
logical Review, (1938), Vol. 45, 1-41.
* Substance and Function fEnp-1. tr.V * CA
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 285
If we consider the factors involved in the measurement of motion, . . .
it is evident that the physical definition of motion cannot be established
without substituting the geometrical body for the sensuous body, without
substituting the "intelligible" continuous extension of the mathematician
for sensuous extension. Before we can speak of motion and its exact
measurement in the strict sense, we must go from the contents of per-
ception to their conceptual limits. ... It is no less a pure conceptual con-
struction, when we ascribe a determinate velocity to a non-uniformly
moving body at each point of its path; such a construction presupposes
for its explanation nothing less than the whole logical theory of in-
finitesimal analysis. But even where we seem to stand closer to direct
sensation, where we seem guided by no other interest than to arrange its
differences as presented us, into a fixed scale, even here theoretical
elements are requisite and clearly appear. It is a long way from the
immediate sensation of heat to the exact concept of temperature. 10
The dynamics of social events provides no exception to this
general characteristic of dynamics. If it were possible to link a
directly observable group behavior, B, with another behavior,
B 1 , B = F (B 1 ) where F means a simple function then
simple rules of procedure for the social practitioner would be
possible. When the practitioner denies that such rules can be
more than poor approximations he seems to imply that the
function, F, is complicated. I am inclined to interpret his
statement actually to mean that in group life, too, "appearance"
should be distinguished from the "underlying facts," that simi-
larity of appearance may go together with dissimilarity of the
essential properties and vice versa, and that laws can be formu-
lated only in regard to these underlying dynamic entities
k = F (n,m) where k,n,m refer not to behavioral symptoms
but to intervening variables. 11
For the social scientist this means that he should give up
thinking about such items as group structure, group tension, or
social forces as nothing more than a popular metaphor or
analogy, which should be eliminated from science as much as
possible. Although there is no need for social science to copy
the specific concepts of the physical sciences, the social scientist
should be clear that he, too, needs intervening variables and
142.,
11 Cf . Lewin, Kurt, A Dynamic Theory of Personality (tr. by D. Adams and
K. Zener), New York: McGraw-Hill (1935).
286 KURT LEWIN
that these dynamic facts rather than the symptoms and appear-
ances are the important points of reference for him and the
social practitioner alike.
7. MATHEMATIZATION AND INTEGRATION OF THE
SOCIAL SCIENCES
The relation between theory formation, fact finding and
mathematization, which Cassirer has described in regard to
the physical sciences, has come much to the fore in the psy-
chology of the last decade. Different psychological trends have
led from different sides and with partly different objectives
to a strong emphasis on mathematization. This need springs
partly from a desire of a more exact scientific representation
of the results of tests or other fact findings and has led to an
elaborate development of statistical procedures. In part the
emphasis on mathematization springs from the desire of a
deeper theoretical insight. 12 Both geometrical and algebraic
concepts are employed to this end.
Mathematical economics since Pareto (1909) is another ex-
ample of the development of a social science which shows many
of the characteristics discussed by Cassirer.
One of the most striking illustrations of the function of
theorems, concepts, and methods in the development of science
is their role in the integration of the social sciences which is
just beginning to take place. It may be appropriate to mention
this problem and to refer briefly to considerations I have pre-
sented elsewhere. 13
Many aspects of social life can be viewed as quasi-stationary
processes. They can be regarded as states of quasi-stationary
equilibrium in the precise meaning of a constellation of forces
the structure of which can be well defined. The scientific treat-
18 Hull, C. L., Principles of Bettavior, New York: Appleton Century (1943)$
Kohler, W., The Place of Value in a World of Facts. New York: Liveright (1938) j
Lewin, Kurt, "The Conceptual Representation and the Measurement of Psycho-
logical Forces," Contributions to Psychological Theory, Vol. I, No. 4, Duke Uni-
versity Press (1938)5 Lewin, Kurt, "Constructs in Psychology and Psychological
Ecology," Studies in Tofological and Vector Psychology, III, University of Iowa.
11 Lewin, Kurt, "Problems of Group Dynamics and the Integration of the Social
Sciences: I. Social Equilibria," Human Relations (1947), Vol. I.
SCIENCE AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 287
ment of social forces presupposes analytic devices which are
adequate to the nature of social processes and which are tech-
nically fitted to serve as a bridge to a mathematical treatment.
The basic means to this end is the representation of social
situations as "social fields."
This technical analysis makes it possible to formulate in a
more exact way problems of planned social changes and of re-
sistance to change. It permits general statements concerning
some aspects of the problem of selecting specific objectives in
bringing about change, concerning different methods of bring-
ing about the same amount of change, and concerning differences
in the secondary effects of these methods. The analytic tools
used are equally applicable to cultural, economic, sociological,
and psychological aspects of group life. They fit a great variety
of processes, such as production levels of a factory, a work-
team and an individual worker; changes of abilities of an indi-
vidual and of capacities of a country; group standards with and
without cultural value; activities of one group and the interac-
tion between groups, between individuals, and between indi-
viduals and groups. The analysis concedes equal reality to all
aspects of group life and to social units of all sizes. The applica-
tion depends upon the structural properties of the process and of
the total situation in which it takes place.
How is it possible, one may ask, to bring together under one
heading and procedure such diversified data? Does that not
necessarily mean losing in concreteness what one might gain
in scientific generality?
In the same way as the natural sciences, the social sciences
have to face the problem of how to get hold conceptually of
the disturbing qualitative richness of psychological and cul-
tural events, how to find "general" laws without giving up
reaching the individual case. Cassirer describes how the mathe-
matical constructive procedure solves this problem by changing,
as it were, the very meaning of equality and scientific abstrac-
tion. Speaking of equalities of mathematical sets he says, "This
similarity, however, means nothing more than that they are
connected by a definite rule, such as permits us to proceed from
one manifold to another by continued identical application of
a88 KURT LEWIN
the same fundamental relation}" 14 "The genuine concept does
not disregard the peculiarities and particularities which it holds
under it, but seeks to show the necessity of the occurrence and
connection of just these particularities." 15
The individual case is not excluded from consideration, but is fixed and
retained as a perfectly determinate step in a general process of change.
It is evident anew that the characteristic feature of the concept is not
the "universality" of a presentation, but the universal validity of a
principle of serial order. We do not isolate any abstract part whatever
from the manifold before us, but we create for its members a definite
relation by thinking of them as bound together by an inclusive law. And
the further we proceed in this and the more firmly this connection ac-
cording to laws is established, so much the clearer does the unambiguous
determination of the particular stand forth. 16
The consideration of quasi-stationary equilibria is based on
analytic concepts which, within the realm of the social sciences,
have emerged first in psychology. The concepts of a psycho-
logical force, of tension, of conflicts as equilibria of forces, of
force fields and of inducing fields, have slowly widened their
range of application from the realm of individual psychology
into the realm of processes and events which had been the
domain of sociology and cultural anthropology. It seems that
the treatment of economic equilibria by mathematical economics,
although having a different origin, is fully compatible with this
development.
The fusion of the social sciences will make accessible to
economics the vast advantages which the experimental pro-
cedure offers for testing theories and for developing new in-
sight. The combination of experimental and mathematical pro-
cedures which Cassirer describes has been the main vehicle for
the integration of the study of light, of electricity, and of the
other branches of physical science. The same combination seems
to be destined to make the integration of the social sciences a
reality.
KURT LEWIN
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
14 Substance and Function (Engl. tr.), 31.
"/Ml., 19.
"Ibid., 20.
8
Robert S. Hartman
CASSIRER'S PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS
CASSIRER'S PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS
I DWELT on the birth of the ego out of the mythical
collective. . . . [The] ego detaches itself from the collec-
tive in the same way that certain figures of Rodin wrest them-
selves out of the stone and awaken from it." Thus, in a speech
at the Library of Congress, 1 Thomas Mann described his
creation of the Joseph figures. In a similar way Cassirer could
have described and did describe 2 the birth of modern self-
consciousness from the matrix of pre-historic myth and medi-
eval metaphysics, the creation of its symbolic forms out of the
raw material of rites and gestures, the emergence of logical
functions from natural material, their gradual liberation and
therewith the self-liberation of consciousness from sensuous
encumbrances.
Symbolic forms are progressive states of the self-emergence
of consciousness. That emergence may be followed in the grad-
ual unfolding of metaphysical thought into modern science as
Cassirer has shown in the first three volumes of the Erkenntnis-
problem or it may be demonstrated in the gradual unfolding
of the raw material and mirroring produce of the self -evolving
consciousness as Cassirer has done in his Philosofhie der
symbolischen Formen?
Both forms of presentation demonstrate one and the same
process of creative thought: in the first case with the emphasis
on the creating mind, in the second with the emphasis on the
created form. As the form, in its successive elaboration, mirrors
1 The Atlantic Monthly, February 1943, 97 ff.
* Cf. Erkenntnisfroblem I, 1 1 f.
1 All references in this essay are to that work, and will be referred to by PSF,
unless otherwise stated. The translations are my own.
291
292 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
the laboring mind, so the mind, in its successive effort, reflects
the form wrought. In the Erkenntnisfroblem Cassirer has
shown the work of the objective spirit in its course; in the
Philosophic der symbolischen Formen he has shown, in the
evolution of its work, the course of the objective spirit. In both
cases he stands at the end of the development, surveying it and
focusing it within his own mind, thus re-creating the energy of
cultural development and sculpturing its forms before our own
eyes, a philosophical seer, whose visual, "synoptic" 4 view of
philosophy both in its historical and conceptual dimension
has rendered to us in ontogeny what the objective spirit has
wrought throughout generations in phylogenic labor. Thus
he has created a new symbolic form, which points beyond itself
toward still higher formations. His work for us, represents
what he calls "a new Composition* of the world, which proceeds
according to specific standards, valid only for itself." 5 Such a
form "must be measured with its own measure. The points of
view, according to which it is to be judged . . . must not be
brought to it from outside, but must be deduced from the
fundamental principle of its own formation." 8 No rigid meta-
physical category must interfere with such "a purely immanent
beginning."
Let us then measure Cassirer with his own measure. We
shall be unable, within the limits of this essay, to extend our
measurements into all the ramifications of the philosophy of
symbolic forms. But we shall be able to follow its formative
principle. From it we shall deduce, and by it justify, our own
procedure. Thus we may hope to catch the spirit of that great
work the spirit of creation itself.
The philosophy of symbolic forms is a philosophy of creation.
The category of creativity is the one we shall apply to and
deduce from his system. In order to do so we must first clear
the way and determine his philosophy negatively against its
two poles, the raw-material of creation and the source of the
creating act. The symbolic form is neither the one nor the
4 PSF, III, viii.
/W,I,iaa.
'I but.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 293
other, but represents the process of creation itself. Confinement
to the raw-material would lead to metaphysics, confinement to
the source of the creative act to psychology. Cassirer's philoso-
phy is neither metaphysics nor psychology} it is neither con-
cerned with pure Being nor with pure Consciousness, but with
the context and interaction of both.
The characteristic and peculiar achievement of each symbolic form
the form of language as well as that of myth or of theoretical cognition
is not simply to receive 7 a given material of impressions possessing already
a certain determination, quality and structure, in order to graft on it,
from the outside, so to speak, another form out of the energy of con-
sciousness itself. The characteristic action of the spirit begins much
earlier. Also, the apparently "given" is seen, on closer analysis, to be
already processed by certain acts of either the linguistic, the mythical,
or the logico-theoretical "apperception." It "is" only that which it has
been made into by those acts. Already in its apparently simple and im-
mediate states it shows itself conditioned and determined by some
primary function which gives it significance. In this primary formation,
and not in the secondary one, lies the peculiar secret of each symbolic
form. 8
Thus there is no "primary datum" underlying the creative
activity of consciousness. Every primary datum is already
spiritually 9 imbued, even the simplest spatial perceptions, like
left and right, high and low. 10 The same is true of the original
sensuous perceptions of time, number, and causality. If these
categories were substantial elements, they could point to an
absolute Being} but such a Being, presupposed by dogmatic
metaphysics, does not exist. Our consciousness cannot posit any
content without, by that very act of positing, setting a whole
complex of other contents. This fact cannot be explained by
dogmatic metaphysics from the presupposition of an absolute
Being j on the contrary, the existence of such a being is contra-
dicted by that very activity of consciousness. 11 An "immediate
T In the sense of the Platonic "receptacle."
*PSF,ll 9 120.
The adjective "spiritual" is used in the sense of the German "geistig."
10 PSF, II, 120.
" PSF 9 I, 31 f., with reference to Kant's Versuch die negatwen Grossen in die
Weltweisheit rimuf&hren.
294 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
datum" is already a material-spiritual context, it is a creatum:
the germ of a symbolic form.
It is obvious, on the other hand, that we cannot understand
the form through insight into the natural causes of its origina-
tion, by the method of psychology rather than that of meta-
physics. What consciousness contributes to the form is as im-
portant as are the contributions of the schemata of space, time,
and number; but it is as little real by itself as are the latter.
There is a third "formative determination," which explains the
world of symbolic forms neither from the nature of the abso-
lute nor from the play of empirico-psychological forces. Al-
though that determination may agree with the method of psy-
chology in acknowledging the fact that the subjectum agens of
the symbolic forms is to be found nowhere else than in the
human consciousness, it does not necessarily have to take
consciousness in either its metaphysical or in its psychological
determination but in a critical analysis which goes beyond
both. "The modern critique of cognition, the analysis of the
laws and principles of knowledge, has freed itself more and
more determinedly from the presuppositions both of meta-
physics and of psychologism." 12
Neither from the side of an absolute being nor from that of
consciousness alone can reality be comprehended. Only in the
combination of both, in the symbolic form as constituted by the
creative activity of the spirit, in the produce, the autonomous
creation of the spirit do we have reality and therewith truth ;
for the highest truth which opens itself to the spirit is finally the form of
its own activity. In the totality of its own accomplishments and the
cognition of the specific rules by which each of them is being determined,
as well as in the consciousness of the connection which combines all these
rules into the unity of one task and one solution: in all this the spirit
possesses the knowledge of itself and of reality. 13
And that knowable reality alone is real.
To the question what absolute reality should be outside of that totality
of spiritual functions, what the "thing in itself" might be in this sense
to this question there is no further answer. It must be understood more
"PSF, II, I5 .
11 WF,
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 295
and more as a falsely put problem, a phantom of thought. The true
concept of reality cannot be pressed into the abstract form of Being, but
becomes merged in the variety and abundance of the forms of spiritual
life a life on which is imprinted the stamp of inner necessity, and there-
with the stamp of objectivity. In this sense each new "symbolic form,"
not only the conceptual world of cognition but also the plastic world of
art, as well as that of myth and of language, signifies, in the words of
Goethe, a revelation from the inner to the outer, a "synthesis of world
and spirit," which alone truly assures us of the original unity of both. 14
The world of symbolic forms is the world of life itself.
Neither in the primitive intuition of the spirit 15 nor in the
primitive perception of natural being can life be comprehended.
Life has left both these states behind, it has transformed itself
into the form of the spirit. 16 "The negation of the symbolic
forms would therefore, instead of apprehending the fullness of
life, on the contrary destroy the spiritual form, to which that
fullness necessarily is bound." 17
We must not passively contemplate these spiritual realities,
but put ourselves right into the midst of their restless activity;
only thus shall we comprehend these realities not as static con-
templations of a metaphysical Being but as formative functions
and energies. In doing so we shall discover in them, however
different the "Gestalten" they produce, certain universal and
typical principles, 18 the principles of creation itself. Recognizing
creation we become creative ourselves: not as dogmatic meta-
physicians but as artists vitalized by and vitalizing our ma-
terial.
Thus, in our interpretation, Cassirer's philosophy is meta-
physics as little as Rodin's figures are stone: if no creative hand
had ever touched the stone it might have remained stone. The
creative touch proved that mere "stone" it never was. If no
creative philosophy had ever liberated the spirit from the
mould of the scholastic system into which it had been "melted
down," 19 then metaphyiscs might have remained metaphysics.
" PSF, 1, 4 8 f.
M /W,I,5i.
17 Ibid.
"F,I, 5 i.
a * Erkenntnisfroblem, I, 1 1 .
296 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
"Only slowly the individual moments of thought, which in
that system were held together as if by a dogmatic force, step
forth in freer movement." 20 From the intellectual struggles of
the Renaissance, to the liberating strike of Kant's Critique of
Reason, to Cassirer's "Critique of Culture," 21 the life-giving
touch works on and transforms metaphysics, until it culminates
in the Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. But being capable of such
transformation it shows itself never to have been mere "meta-
physics." Critical philosophers, and Cassirer in particular, could
vitalize metaphysics as Rodin could the stone. It may be instruc-
tive to compare the nature of Cassirer's material with that of
Rodin's.
Rodin's "stone" never was just stone. Rodin only knew
living surfaces. These surfaces consisted of infinitely many
movements.
The play of light upon them made manifest that each of these move-
ments was different and significant. At this point they seemed to flow
into one another; at that to greet each other hesitatingly; at a third to
pass by each other without recognition, like strangers. There were
undulations without end. There was no point at which there was not
life and movement. ... He saw only innumerable living surfaces, only
life. 22
Cassirer's philosophy never was just metaphysics. 23 Meta-
physics, as ontology, is the discipline of pure Being, but there
never was pure Being. In the interaction of the thinker's mind
with the raw material of his thought arises a new reality:
Reality proper. That reality appears in "symbolic forms"
forms which rise under the dynamic movement of thought like
Rodin's figures under the magic of his hands. Like on Rodin's
surfaces, the light of reality plays on these forms, which refract
it in a thousand manifestations.
When one characterizes language, myth, art, as "symbolic forms,"
M Rilke, Rainer Maria, Rodin, New York: The Fine Editions Press, 1945, n f.
9 Somewhat doubtful in this respect is W. C. Swabey in his book-report on
the PMlosophie der symbolise/ten Formen, Philosophical Review, vol. XXXIII,
No. 2, 1924, 195.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 297
then there seems to lie in that expression the presupposition that all of
them, as definite formative modes of the spirit, point back to a last
primary layer of reality, 24 which is seen through them only, like through
a strange medium. Reality seems to become comprehensible for us only
in the particular state of those forms; in them it both conceals and re-
veals itself. The same fundamental functions which give the world
of the spirit its determination, its imprint and character, appear on the
other hand as just so many refractions which Reality, uniform and
unique in itself, experiences as soon as it is being apperceived and ap-
propriated by the "subject." The philosophy of symbolic 'forms is,
seen under this point of view, nothing but the attempt to indicate for
each of them, as it were, the definite index of refraction. It wants to
recognize the particular nature of the different refracting media. 25
Those indices determine the activity of the spirit, defining
it in terms of the "modalities" 26 which the spirit assumes in
each particular medium. The life of the spirit thus is "multi-
dimensional j" 27 there are undulations without end, movements,
dynamic processes. Like Rodin's statues they grow out of the
undifferentiated sensuous matrix into the determinacy of ob-
jective thought indeed, like Rodin's own "Thought," a head
growing out of the stone, or his "Thinker," shaped from him-
self, pondering the abundance of forms crowding "The Gate
of Hell," in deep symbolism.
The process of differentiation is a process of objectivation. As
Rodin followed religiously the laws of nature, the way he him-
self successively discovered them, 28 so Cassirer follows the laws
of the spirit as he uncovers them. There are two main laws, The
Law of Continuity each phase is the fulfilment of the preced-
ing one and The Law of New Emphasis each phase de-
velops the preceding one. 29 These, of course, are nothing but the
laws of growth itself. As the forms grow their "moments"
change, their "accents" shift. The three stages or "dimensions"
" Cf. II, 50.
* PSF, III, 3.
II, i6il, 9 ff,2 9 ff.
38 Story, Sommerville, "Auguste Rodin and His Work," in Rodin, New York:
Phaidon Edition, Oxford University Press, 1939, n.
298 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
of shift are Expression, Presentation, Meaning (Ausdruck,
Darstellung, Bedeutung). These stages are not isolated from
one another but contain "points" at which the forms flow into
one another, greet each other hesitatingly or pass each other
without recognition, like strangers. In the first stage, Expres-
sion, the subject "possesses" the environment as a variety of
physiognomic experiences. 30 Long before there are "things"
there is such structurization of experience. "Existence," "re-
ality," are at that stage physiognomically manifest. The ab-
straction of "pure" perception, which is the starting point of
dogmatic sensualism, is here already transcended. The datum
which the subject experiences as being "opposite" to him is here
transparent with inner life, not exterior or dumb. This is the
stage at which myth and art originate, and where, with hesitat-
ing greeting, they meet language, which, in the Sentence, takes
up 31 and transcends that stage, setting the new dimension,
Presentation. The sentence, however, only very gradually
swings itself upward into the new dimension. It remains bound
to the physiognomic realm, substituting logical determination
for spatial demonstration. Only gradually it expands from per-
ceptual and emotional perspectives to full objectivation, in three
steps again: the mimic, where it remains in the plastic world,
in the spatial meanings of the copula, the demonstrative pro-
nouns, the definite article, onomatopoetic formations, and the
rendering of the physiognomic characters through voiced or
voiceless consonants, higher or lower vowels j the analogic,
where in the relation of sounds the relations of the objects are
expressed , and, finally, the symbolic, where all similarity be-
tween the world of language and that of objects has dis-
appeared. Only in this last form, in the distance from the lower
stages, language comes entirely into its own. 32 The three stages
of language are thus, as it were, steps by which the spirit passes
from the physiognomic to the presentative dimension, and
beyond it into that of meaning.
Whereas language and mythos partly flow into, partly greet
" PSF, III, 5245 71.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 299
each other, mythos and logos pass by each other without recog-
nition, like strangers. The scientific concept is past the physio-
gnomic level. 83 "Cognition" implies distance from the world,
a "cut" between "nature" and the world of feeling. The concept
starts its career on the level of perception, where it meets
language, to ascend in harmony with it, in order, finally, to
transcend it through three stages again, corresponding to the
three stages of language} the mimic, in the platonic *pwww
from things to ideas, 34 with its correspondence between both;
the analogic, in Kepler-Galileo-Newtonian science, where the
correspondence between the world of objects and that of con-
cepts has disappeared in detail but still persists in the corre-
spondence of structures, especially in the model of a
given space j and the symbolic, in the modern scientific concept
with its purely symbolic "space" without any correspondence to
the perceptual world. In this last stage the process of objectiva-
tion is completed, the symbols stand freely and in full self-
consistent significance above the raw material of the world.
Yet, they point to it and give it its final and culminating mean-
ing, fulfilling in their lofty sweep the grunt, the first gesture
of the man of primal times.
Rodin's "Man of Primal Times" 35 shows precisely this: the
unlimited promise of that first gesture, the unfolding of thought
from hand.
It indicates in the work of Rodin the birth of gesture. That gesture
which grew and developed to such greatness and power, here bursts
forth like a spring that softly ripples over this body. It awakens in the
darkness of primal times and in its growth seems to flow through the
breadth of this work as though reaching out from bygone centuries to
those that are to come. Hesitatingly it unfolds itself in the lifted arms.
These arms are still so heavy that the hand of one rests upon the top of
the head. But this hand is roused from its sleep, it concentrates itself
quite high on the top of the brain where it lies solitary. It prepares for
the work of centuries, a work that has no measure and no end. 8e
"PSF,!!!, 526.
M Alsowcalled "The Age of Bronze."
* Rilke, op. cit tj 24.
300 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
Gesture is the first awkward manifestation of the spontaneity
of spirit which flowers forth in the full bloom of the symbolic
forms. In its beginning even the primal forms of the synthetiz-
ing function of consciousness, 87 space, time, and number, are
nothing but corporeal motions "that softly ripple over the
body." Space arises from the demonstrative gestures of Here
and There, I and Thou, and expands in concentric circles around
the speaker, whose body is the first system of spatial coordina-
tion. 88 Thomas Mann's Joseph is still a mythical but also already
an individual figure, as he describes his own and his Ishmaelite
fellow travelers' universes:
The world hath many centres, one for each created being, and about
each one it lieth in its own circle. Thou standest but half an ell from
me, yet about thee lieth a universe whose centre I am not but thou art.
. . . And I, on the other hand, stand in the centre of mine. For our
universes are not far from each other so that they do not touch; rather
hath God pushed them and interwoven them deep into each other. 89
That body-space finally becomes the pure-brain-space of mod-
ern relativity theory. Time, originally woven into the spatial
determination of Here and There as Now and Then, 40 becomes
the purely mental symbol of our physical science. And number
itself, "originally a hand concept, not a thought concept," 41
develops out of its bodily encumbrance into the lofty realm it
has so elaborately carved out today; now not only a content
of thought but even a way of thinking, 42 a means of sharper and
sharper determination of the indeterminate. 43
Thus, like filigree work chiseled out from heavy walls, the
final Gestalten of the symbolic forms stand out in relief against
the background of metaphysics. The vertical "schemata" of the
structure, reaching throughout the whole dis-cursus of con-
sciousness, 44 are the formative principles: space, time, and
"PSF,!!!, 1 6.
M PSF,I, 156.
89 Mann, Thomas, Joseph in Egyft, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1 939, Vol. 1, 4.
*PF,I, i6 7 ff.
41 /W, III, 397-
*PSF, III, 468.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 301
number. The horizontal "dimensions" are the forms of expres-
sion, presentation, and meaning. These latter are principles of
differentiation, carrying forward the relief into ever finer
ramifications. Thus the creative activity of the spirit resembles
that of sculpture even in the method, "the process of removal," 45
to use the words of Michelangelo. The combination of both the
horizontal and the vertical principles of formation are the sym-
bolic forms, myth, language, art, religion, theoretical cognition:
peculiar energies of the spirit, 46 with their own "modalities"
and their own particular "planes of reality" (Seinsebenen)* 1
their own position and Gestalt on the metaphysical background.
Their ultimate refinement has lost all semblance to its meta-
physical matrix, just as filigree on a wall, or a sculptured hand
by Rodin, have lost all semblance to their own concrete ma-
terial. It has lost almost even the texture of the background.
It is pure symbol either script, as the filigree on the walls of
the Alhambra of Granada, or something sui generis, as a mem-
ber sculptured by Rodin. "A hand laid on another's shoulder
or thigh does not any more belong to the body from which it
came from this body and from the object which it touches
or seizes something new originates, a new thing that has no
name and belongs to no one." 48 It is a symbol.
The symbol, though of sensuous material, yet transcends
that materiality and points toward a content in the higher
forms of Meaning. Its materiality is completely absorbed, in
that function of meaning, 49 its "symbolic pragnanz." It is
subjected under the sensuous; yet that subjection is at the same
time freedom from the sensuous. 51 The capacity of the sen-
suous material to point toward a world of meanings, to
symbolize it without co-inciding with it this clothing of the
sensuous with ideal meaning is indeed "das Mysterium des
45 Cf. II, 2 89* Erkenntnisfroblem I, 5 f.
,,
*PSF,l, 28 f.
48 Rilke, op. /., 30.
"PSF, III, 234. The similarity of Cassirer's terminology with that of Gestalt
psychology is a conscious one. Symbolic forms are "Gestaltcn."
, 41.
302 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
Wirkens schlechthin"** the mystery of creative activity far
excellence. It cannot suddenly accrete to the sensitive faculty
out of nothing, but must be part of the very nature of that
faculty from its first beginnings. There is, in the sensuous
itself,
to use an expression of Goethe, an' "exact sensuous imagination," which
appears active in the most diverse realms of spiritual and mental creativity.
Each of these realms gives rise, as the true vehicle of its own immanent
process, beside and above the world of perception, to a free world of
images, a world which in its immediate quality still bears the hue of
the sensuous, but that sensuousness is formed and therewith spiritually
dominated. We do not encounter the sensuous as a simple datum, but as
a system of sensuous varieties, which are being produced in all kinds of
free creation. 53
In other words, not only is there no absolute metaphysical Be-
ing, there is, on the other hand, not even an absolutely given
sensuous perception. The network of meanings is present in
germ, in f>otentia y in the first ripples of expression. Already then
there is not only the substance of the material, but also the
function of meaning in it. "The fundamental function of mean-
ing is there before the positing of the individual sign, so that
in that positing that function is not created but only fixated,
only applied to an individual case." 54 Substance and function,
material and meaning, the sensuous and the "intelligible" are
originally fused in the unity of primary symbols. As the
process of objectivation, of spiritualization continues, the sub-
stantial is gradually chiseled off, "in a process of removal,"
and the functional appears in greater and greater purity. But
substance and function never lose their mutual interdependence
the filigree of the Alhambra is still on the wall, and Rodin's
sculptured hand is still of bronze. That primary fusion in the
symbolic, this primacy of the symbolic junction, is the secret
of all symbolic forms and all spiritual activity. There is no Out-
side or Inside here, no Before or After, nothing Active or Pas-
sive. Here we have a union of elements, which did not have
11 POT, m, 119.
"POT, I, 19 f.
" POT, I, 41.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 303
to be constructed, but was a primary meaningful whole which
belongs only to itself and interprets itself alone. In the fusion
of body and soul we have the paradigm and prototype of such
a relation. 55
The moments of succession, as we find them in space and
time, the connections of conditions such that the one appears as
"thing," the other as "quality," the connection of successive
events such that the one appears as cause, the other as effect:
all these are examples of how the original fusion is gradually
loosened and ramified. At the end of the development stands
modern man, his intellect almost disengaged from his sensuous
and social 86 background. Not without reason Cassirer's last
published work had to be An Essay on Man.
The principles of formation, present in the gestures of the
man of primal times, brought about the intellect of the man
of modern times. The hand resting on the brain of Rodin's
figure symbolizes the entire power of that primal gesture.
That hand does not rest there any more it has emancipated
itself in the actions of that brain, 87 from which proceeded both
modern science and technology, more like Ares than Athene.
In the Critical philosophy the threads had been laid bare by
which intellect is knitted to perception. For Kant "the intellect
is the simple transcendental expression for the fundamental
phenomenon that all perception, as conscious, always and neces-
sarily must be jormed perception." 58 In Cassirer's philosophy
the threads are traced back to their very origin in the original
skein of cultural life: the critique of reason is expanded and
empirically substantiated in Cassirer's critique of culture. But,
after showing the entire many-branched labyrinth of man's
development to modernity, Cassirer focuses on the hero him-
self, a modern Theseus, who has left the guiding hand of
nature and, at the end of his course, encounters a monster, the
master of the maze, the Minotaur of Machinery, ready to de-
vour him. Will man slay it or will he be slain?
55 PSF, in, 117.
M Originally spatial.
OT PSF, II, 266: Technology as "organ projection."
" PSF, III, 2124.
304 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
It all depends on whether the original power of symboliza-
tion is still living in him. For symbolization is power. Rodin's
sculptured limbs are creations of a powerful energy which has
appropriated the material and bent it to its will. The power of
symbolization is a power of concentration and condensation, a
Kraft der Verdichtung active in all symbolic forms. "It is as if
through the creation of the new symbol, a tremendous energy
of thought is being transformed from a relatively diffuse into
more concentrated form." 80 That energy is the spontaneity, the
creative freedom of the spirit, a freedom not arbitrary, but
producing within the modalities of the symbolic forms. 161 It is a
power which contains within itself the entire force of cultural
evolution the symbol concentrates in one intense moment the
entire cultural energy, diffuse in its manifold forms from past
to future: a "revelation in the material." 62 Man will slay the
monster, if he has the power of the symbol: to find his way
back to nature and at the same time to look forward into the
future, if he is able to concentrate and symbolically to divine
past and future in the present. He must become a prophet:
a symbol himself of his own origin and destination. 63
For us Cassirer was such a "symbolic man," and so was
Rodin. Both knew the nature and power of the symbol. Rodin
saw man himself as a symbol. "When I have a beautiful wom-
an's body as a model, the drawings I make of it also give me
pictures of insects, birds, and fishes. That seems incredible and
I did not know it myself until I found out." 84 Cassirer found
a similarly incredible content in the "symbolic forms" of the
spirit. Each of them symbolizes the totality of cultural evolu-
tion. Consciousness cannot posit anything without positing
every thing j in the Goethean words, often quoted by Cassirer,
Truly the mental fleece
Resembles a weaver's masterpiece,
**PSF, III, 466.
60 Ibid.
"PSF,e.g. I, 20.
"PSF, I, 46.
M Cf. Essay on Man y 55, 61.
** Story, op. tit., 14 f.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 305
Where a thousand threads one treadle throws,
Where fly the shuttles hither and thither
Unseen the threads are knit together,
And an infinite combination grows.
The symbol, the material content clothed with the ideal mean-
ing of the whole infinite composition, is therefore the "natural"
product of consciousness, the symbolic function its natural func-
tion. A healthy consciousness must in every act, to the degree
and extent of that act, shuttle back and forth throughout the
aeons of cultural development and knit all of them into the
act. To the degree that it achieves this it is free from its sensuous
origins: it is human. The essence of humanity is a free con-
sciousness, roaming widely over cultural space and time. "Hu-
man culture taken as a whole may be described as the process
of man's progressive self-liberation.'* 65 The more symbolic an
act, therefore, the more it is a truly human act. The more it
presents a cultural content, the more it must represent all
culture. Ethically as well as epistemologically, the develop-
ment of presentation is progressive representation. Man's self-
liberation proceeds proportionately to his capacity for symbolic
representation. Representation is the act of manifesting spiritual
energy in sensuous material. It is the fundamental function of
consciousness, exhibited in the primal gesture of the savage as
well as in the mathematical analysis of the man of advanced
studies. Between both activities is a difference of degree, but
not of kind. In all intellectual activity this function is being
applied, or rather, all intellectual activity is this function. Only
in human behavior it is not yet manifest} only man himself
has not yet become a symbol unto himself. In the social sphere
the relationship between symbol and reality has not yet been
found. It must be found} social reality must be filled with
symbolic meaning. Thus the tension between symbol and
reality 66 would be consummated. The other alternative of con-
summation would be the effacement of man, the flattening out
of the spirited ripple that rose as form over the faceless deep.
The differentiation of the formless, similar to the structuriza-
85 Essay on Man, 228.
306 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
tion of the Awpov by the 9<*S or the articulation of 5Xi) by \MW
this is the function of Form in Cassirer's philosophy (even
though limited to the field of human culture and on the level
of transcendental correlation rather than that of metaphysical
opposition, as it was in the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle
and later in that of Hegel). 67 Form is not a static thing, a shape,
but a dynamic principle, the totality of characters that transform
sensuous impressions into intellectual and spiritual expressions."
In its totality alone the form finds truth} truth is the whole
herein Cassirer agrees with Hegel, calling part of his own
philosophy a "Phenomenology of Cognition." 09
The end, the "telos" of the spirit cannot be comprehended or pro-
nounced, if one takes it by itself, severed from its beginning and middle.
Philosophical reflection does not in this way set off the end against
middle and beginning, but takes all three as integral moments of one
unique total movement. 70
In this total context, then, every element of the form, every
one of its "differentials" 71 is representative of the whole. As for
Rodin the beauty of the woman is representative of all creation,
so for Cassirer the characteristic of one cultural unit, whether
a vowel in language, a ritual in religion or an algorithm in
mathematics, mirrors monadlike 72 the whole universe of forms.
As Rodin's model is an end product of evolution, but as such
again a middle term between the universal premise of evolution
and the conclusion drawn by Rodin's pencil, so the symbolic
unit is an end of the formative development preceding it, but
also a mediator between that development and Cassirer's con-
ception of it. At the same time these units are mediators be-
tween the preceding and successive stages, and focal points of
the entire development.
The form of sensuous reality is based on the fact that the individual
moments of which it is built up do not stand by themselves, but that
OT Cf. PSF, III, 13, 230, and infra 312 ff., 322.
, 12.
, I, 40} III, 235-
, 102.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 307
between them takes place a peculiar relation of "corn-positing" (Mit-
setzung). Nowhere is here anything isolated and detached. Even that
which seems to belong to a certain single spatial point or temporal
moment, does not remain immersed in the mere Here and There. It
reaches beyond itself into the totality of all empirical contents. 73
The higher reality unfolds itself, the richer its pattern be-
comes and the fuller of symbolic functions will be the contents
that offer themselves to consciousness.
The farther that process continues, the wider a circle consciousness is
able to span in a single moment. Each of its elements is now saturated,
as it were, with such functions. It stands in varied meaningful contexts,
which again are connected and which, by virtue of that connection,
constitute a whole, which we denote as the world of our "experience."
Whatever contexts one may isolate from this totality of "experience"
. . . always their orders will show a definite structure and a common
fundamental character. They are of such a nature, that from everyone
of their moments a transition is possible to the whole, just as the con-
stitution of the whole is presentable and presented in every moment. 74
Every phenomenon is now only a letter within the script of
total reality. 75
Thus it is possible to span the whole world in a moment.
Physical science is doing that, comprehending the totality of
events by representing each event through its four space-time
coordinates and reducing the variation of these coordinates to
(more or less) final invariant laws/ 8 It thus obtains what science
calls the "truth" of the phenomena, which is nothing else but
their totality, "taken not in their concrete state but in the form
of an ideal coordination" That coordination is based both
on logical connections and logical distinctions, on synthesis
as well as analysis. The higher a symbol, that is to say the more
numerous and the more complex the phenomena it refers to,
the more different will be its own form, its shape, from that
of the phenomena themselves, and the greater the "distance"
l, 80.
"Ibid.
308 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
between the sensuous and the symbolic content of consciousness
but the greater that "distance" the greater, because the more
comprehensive, the more "universal," will be the "truth." Fi-
nally the symbol contains nothing but the 'principle of the forms
it represents, the constitutive law of their structure, the genetic
essence of their formation. It thus refers not to the similarity of
the forms, but to their inner connective law, which may or may
not express itself in similarities of form. 78 Thus the common
constructive principle of the conic sections is not betrayed in
any similarity of shape. Again we are reminded of Rodin, who
in all his work looked for the latent principles of natural move-
ment. "Such was the basis of what is called my Symbolism.
I do not mind being called a Symbolist, if that will define the
essential principle of sculpture." 79 It was not enough for Rodin
to study nature and follow it so closely that "The Man of
Primal Times" was suspected to be cast from the living model.
He tried to find the principle of movement by what he called
a method of "logical exaggeration." "My aim was then, after
the 'Burghers of Calais,' to find ways of exaggerating logi-
cally." 80 Indeed, what could be sensuously as well as significantly
more expressive than calling ellipse, parabola and hyperbola
"logical exaggerations" of the circle!
Logical exaggeration consists, among other things, in the
"constant reduction of the face to a geometrical figure, and the
resolve to sacrifice every part of the face to the synthesis of its
aspect," 81 that is to say, the totality of its features. That totality
is sometimes enhanced by subtraction.
Take the Cathedral of Chartres as an example: one of its towers is
massive and without ornamentation, having been neglected in order
that the exquisite delicacy of the other could be better seen. In sculpture
the projection of the sheaths of muscles must be accentuated, the shorten-
ings heightened, the holes made deeper. Scultpure is the art of the hole
and the lump. 82
I, 88.
70 Story, op. cit., 14.
*
J bid.
"Ibid.
"Ibid.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 309
The "process of removal" thus is a succession of dialectic steps
in the totality of the form's movement.
Not in continuous quantitative accretion, but in the sharpest dialectic
contradiction the various fundamental ideas oppose each other in the
truly critical epochs of cognition. . . , 88 The myth [e.g.,] would not be
a truly spiritual form, if its unity were nothing but oppositionless sim-
plicity. . . , The individual stages of its development do not simply
join themselves one to the other, but often oppose each other in sharp
contrast. The process consists in the fact that certain fundamental traits,
certain spiritual determinations of the preceding stages are not only
elaborated and supplemented, but are also being negated, indeed an-
nihilated. 84
Whatever obstructs the law of process of the total form is being
eliminated. The symbol itself cannot contain anything that is not
part of the totality: it shows "hole and lump." It is not similar
to the symbolized content, but somehow in its shape is found the
principle of the totality of the represented forms, visible to the
eye of the synoptic seer, whether he be of plastic imagination
like Rodin or of philosophical imagination like Cassirer. Some
day, perhaps, a logic of symbolic forms will be written, based
on the combined insight of both philosopher and artist.
That logic would have to be symbolic of the entire fullness of
life, its symbolism saturated with live meanings and not "sick-
lied o'er with the pale cast" of positivism. Cassirer's philosophy
of symbolic forms is such a truly symbolic logic, culminating,
as it does, in the symbols of mathematics, the "logic of inven-
tion," as it was called both by Galileo and Leibniz. But Cas-
sirer's "Ansatz" the method and tendency of his work, points
further: to an expansion of his method into the very field of the
arts, into a logical symbolism or symbolic logic of painting and
sculpture as well as of music, thus, in due time, to a method
which will make these forms of consciousness as definitely and
determinedly symbolic of life's fullness maybe even in the
form of communication 85 as now are the "rational" signs of
88 Erkenntnisproblem, I, 5.
M PF, II, 289. Cf. infra 879 f.
85 Cf . Langer, Susanne K., Philosophy in a New Key, Cambridge, Mass. : Har-
vard University Press, 1942, 2i8fL, and passim.
3io ROBERT S. HARTMAN
language and mathematics. Seen under this view, not of eternity
but of long term development, Cassirer's "phenomenology of
cognition" is as much a precursor of a new logic as was HegePs
phenomenology only in a much wider sense, comparable, per-
haps, to Leibniz' divined rather than elaborated scientia gener-
alis as a precursor of modern mathematical science.
Indeed, in its emphasis on the totality of the formative
process Cassirer's philosophy agrees with HegePs phenome-
nology; in its emphasis on the fullness of life it draws inspiration
from Leibniz' scientia generalis. With Hegel he has only the
"Ansatz" 9 * in common; HegePs phenomenology "finally, so to
speak, sharpens itself into a highest logical point. . . . How rich
and varied ever its content, its structure is subject to a single
and in a way uniform law." 87 The logic to which Cassirer points
is a logic of creation, a logic of invention in a sense much wider
even than that divined by Galileo and Leibniz as wide and
varied, in fact, as life itself. The structure of his work does
not suffer from HegePs shortcomings, from compression into
a too narrow scheme. On the contrary, if criticism is in order,
Cassirer's work seems almost too little inhibited, too artfully
rambling at times in the fascinating regions it discloses, the
style too ornamental sometimes to be fully effectful. 88 It is a
work of art, full of life, showing, as does Rodin's work, "life in
movement." 89 For Rodin it is the life of natural forms, for
Cassirer the life of cultural forms. Rodin had nude models
moving about in his studio,
to supply him constantly with the picture of nudity in various attitudes
and with all the liberty of ordinary life. He was constantly looking at
them, and thus was always familiar with the spectacle of muscles in
88 In contrast, for example, to the condensed imagery of Bergson. HegePs often
atrocious German cannot be compared to the elegance of Cassirer's style. Although
Cassirer was not as electrifying a personality as was Bergson, he was an absorbingly
interesting lecturer. His classrooms, as one of his students expressed it, "seemed
to be the halls where there was no life but the life of thought. In his lectures the
spirit itself seemed to speak to the brains of men." This is a far cry from the utter
dryness of HegePs presentation, the effect of which seems to have been one of the
riddles of his time (not only to Schopenhauer).
w Story, of cit. t 9.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 311
movement. Thus the nude, which today people rarely see, and which
even sculptors only see during the short period of the pose, was for
Rodin an ordinary spectacle. . . . The face is usually regarded as the
only mirror of the soul, and mobility of features is supposed to be the
only exteriorization of spiritual life. But in reality there is not a muscle
of the body which does not reveal thoughts and feelings. 90
Only the highest functions of the human mind seem to express
the creativity of the spirit} Kant, and in a way even Hegel, as
well as most of the post-Kantian philosophers before Cassirer,
were interested in them mainly. Even Cassirer demonstrated
the creativeness of thought first in its highest functions, in the
field of abstract science. 91 Only gradually he worked down from
the brain to the lower and lowlier parts of the body, finally to
the gestures of the members, the movement of the muscles,
until the entire body of man stood before his eyes vibrating
with spiritual life. All the forms of that life were then con-
stantly before his view; for over thirty years he constantly
looked at them. He seemed, like Rodin, "obsessed by a sort of
divine intoxication for form." 92 "The living motion of the spirit
must be apprehended in its actuality, in the very energy of its
movement." 93 "Procedere" is only apprehensible through proc-
ess, in its Fortgang. Only by constantly following the forms of
the spirit and sculpturing them in their process can one appre-
hend them.
The true, the concrete totality of the spirit must not be denoted in a
simple formula at the beginning and so to speak presented ready made,
but it develops, it finds itself only in the constantly advancing process 94
of critical analysis itself. 95
Just as the eyes of the sculptor must follow his models' mo-
tions constantly and apprehend them in motor empathy, so the
spirit itself, as analysis, must follow the "stetig weiterschrei-
90 Story, op. cit.y 13.
91 In Substance and Function.
"Story, of. cit. t 26.
""Im stetig weiterschreitenden Fortgang." The translation cannot render the
plastic expressiveness of Cassirer's style.
"PSFJy 10.
312 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
tenden Fortgang? "the steadily further striding onwalking,"
of the symbolic forms parading before the philosopher's eyes
like models before the artist. "The perimeter of spiritual reality
can be designated, defined and determined only by pacing it
.off in the process." 96 The whole of the objective spirit thus
reveals itself gradually as an organic unity, steadily growing
and developing in a "definite systematic scale, an ideal progress,
as the end of which may be stated that the spirit in its own
formations and self-created symbols not only is and lives, but
that it comprehends them as they are." 07 In this respect again
the philosophy of symbolic forms connects with HegePs phe-
nomenology: "the end of development consists in the com-
prehension and expression of spiritual reality not only as sub-
stance, but 'just as much as subject'." 98 But there is an important
difference between HegePs and Cassirer's phenomenology,
which can be illustrated by Cassirer's attitude toward HegePs
historical theory.
The concept of a history of science contains the idea of the conservation
of a universal logical structure in the succession of particular conceptual
systems. Indeed: if the earlier content of thought would not be con-
nected with the succeeding one by some identity, there would be nothing
to justify our comprising the scattered logical fragments then at hand,
in a series of becoming events. Each historical series of evolution needs
a "subject" as a substratum in which to present and exteriorize itself.
The mistake of the metaphysical theory of history lies not in the fact
that it demands such a subject, but in the fact that it reifies it, by speak-
ing of the self-development of an "Idea," a progress of the "World
Spirit," and so on. We must renounce such reified carrier standing
behind the historical movement; the metaphysical formula must be
changed into a methodological formula. Instead of a common sub-
stratum we only demand an intellectual continuity in the individual
phases of development."
That is to say, just as the sculptor is not interested in the per-
sonality of his models as such, but in their symbolic significance
for the laws of nature, so the philosopher of symbolic forms
"ibid.
"Ibid.
* Erkenntnisfroblem, I, 16. Italics mine.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 313
is not interested in the subject matter of the forms as such,
but only their significance for the whole context in which they
appear. "It is the task of philosophy . . . again and again, from
a concrete historical aggregate of certain scientific concepts and
principles to set forth the universal logical functions of cogni-
tion in general." 100 In this respect the histories of science and of
philosophy are two aspects of one and the same intellectual
process, for which Galileo and Kepler, Newton and Euler are
just as valid witnesses as Descartes or Leibniz. 101 The process
is an empirical logical, not a metaphysical logical process. It is
the historical process by which the cultural realities have
evolved.
From the sphere of sensation to that of perception, from perception to
conceptual thinking, and from that again to logical judgment there
leads, for critical epistemology, one steady road. Each later moment
comprises the earlier, each earlier prepares the later. All the elements
constituting cognition refer both to themselves and the "object." Sen-
sation, perception, are in germ already comprehension, judgment, con-
clusion. 102
Neither in the treatment of the philosophical systems nor
in that of the cultural forms is Cassirer concerned with estab-
lishing a metaphysical subjective idealism. He is not dogmatic
in any way 5 the dogmatic systems of metaphysics are in most
cases nothing but
hypostases of certain logical, aesthetical, or religious principles. The more
they seclude themselves into the abstract generality of principle, the
more they preclude themselves from other sides of spiritual culture and
the concrete totality of its forms. 103
With that totality Cassirer is concerned, in it he finds intellec-
tual creativity active. The existence of such creativeness thus
becomes for him not a matter of principle even though orig-
inally it was a postulate 104 but a question of fact. In the rich-
ness of that concrete totality he finds, through the ingenious
100 ibid.
101 Erkenntnisproblem, I, i o.
* Erkenntnisfroblem, 1, 1 8.
314 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
interpretation of the symbolic function, a whole systematic of
the spirit, where each particular form receives its meaning pure-
ly by the position it has within the system, a kind of periodic
system of cultural forms. Only that system is never closed, but
ever active, ever in process, 105 reality thus never being but
ever becoming, the ideal goal of the process rather than the
process itself.
Being concerned with the universal meaning in concrete re-
ality rather than in an abstract principle, which would only
detract from that meaning, and in the sifting of that meaning
from all the forms of reality itself, Cassirer is not interested only
in completed philosophical systems, nor in fully grown cultural
forms. Similar or even identical concepts might conceal differ-
ent, even contrasting meanings, 106 and most significant features
might be found in byroads hitherto overlooked. The manifold
attempts and beginnings of research in all cultural forms are
the trickles from which the formula of universal cultural prog-
ress must be distilled. 107 In the frozen shapes of these forms the
original dynamics of their movement must be detected. Cassirer
inquired into all these forms, torsos, trunks of forms, with
never resting zeal, presenting not only full grown treatises
like the three great master works, but a host of monographs on
particular questions. In all this his reasoning was profound;
he aimed to crystallize the leading idea of cultural movement,
its dynamic soul. Similarly Rodin in an unheard of procedure
for a sculptor, exhibited
human figures deprived of a head, legs or arms, which at first shock
the beholder, but on examination are found to be so well balanced and
so perfectly harmonized that one can only find beauty in them. His
reason for this is artistically profound. ... In the development of a
leading idea of thought, of meditation, of the action of walking, his
desire was to eliminate all that might counteract or draw attention from
this central thought. "As to polishing nails or ringlets of hair, that has
no interest for me," he said; "it detracts attention from the leading
line and the soul which I wish to interpret." 108
1M Perhaps, in the light of the newest atomic achievements, this is also true for
the periodic system of elements.
108 Cf. Erkenntnlsfroblem^ I, 10.
10T Cf. Erkenntnis'problem, I, 9.
108 Story, op.cit., 13.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 315
Just as little did Cassirer have time for the trimmings of the
cultural process. His painstaking search for phenomena was the
search for the essential, the symbolic in them. But, since the
symbolic is never found in purity 109 but only fulfilled in the
totality of the process, and the process is never finished but al-
ways proceeding, the search for the symbol itself is never ending
but always asymptotic. Just as for Rodin and for every great
master it was never Cassirer's habit "to undertake a work,
complete it and have done with it. He always had by him a
number of ideas and thoughts on which he meditated patiently
for years as they ripened in his mind." 110 By the time he wrote
the Essay on Man Cassirer saw the problems of the Philosophy
of the Symbolic Forms from a different angle and in a new
light. 111
Now it was no longer so much the totality of the process that
interested him, but one moment of its concrete fullness: the
reference to man. The asymptotic openness of the process, the
lofty culmination in merely intellectual symbols now has given
place to a fuller harmony: a human universe. Now the sym-
bolic forms were to help man to slay the monster and continue
the process of life itself. Now it is no longer science which is
the great culmination, but art Cassirer has moved toward the
new logic towards which we see his work tending. On the last
page of the Essay we read the famous words of Kant, that we
can learn all about Newton's principles of natural philosophy,
however great a mind may have been required to discover them;
but we cannot learn to write spirited poetry, however explicit
may be the precepts of the art and however excellent its models.
We learn that the highest of forms is not an abstract "logical
function," but that it is genius himself, homo creator. Now the
whole of science is a flat dimension as compared with the di-
mension of man himself. Not only "ex analogia universi" but,
even more, "ex analogia hominis" we must understand the
world. And it is on a note of musical harmony that this last
great work of Cassirer ends:
All these functions complete and complement one another. Each one
" PSF, III, 142.
110 Story, op. cit., 13.
** Essay on Man, vii.
316 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
opens a new horizon and shows us a new aspect of humanity. The dis-
sonant is in harmony with itself; the contraries are not mutually exclu-
sive, but interdependent: "harmony in contrariety, as in the case of the
bow and the lyre." 112
The spirit of Leibniz, in the new form of warm human concern,
has conquered the Hegelian aloofness in Cassirer's mind. Now
spontaneity and productivity are no more prerogatives of "the
objective spirit" or "the symbolic function," but are "the very
center of all human activities." 113 The philosophy of symbolic
forms has become the philosophy of man. Man himself now is
the central symbolic form. The symbolic process is now no
longer so much one of "dematerialization," 114 "a process of
removal," but of spiritualization, a process of strengthening
the differentiation of matter by a new energy: the spiritual
energy of harmonization. That energy combines the human
world into a symphony of meanings. It strengthens itself
through its wedlock with matter. Has it been an original partner
of matter from the beginning? Has the harmony between it and
matter been pre-established from the beginning and is the whole
development of the forms nothing but the elaboration of that
pre-established harmony? And is the appearance of that har-
mony in the logic of symbols nothing but that harmony's
revelation in matter? Cassirer never answers these Leibnizian
questions} although, with unconcerned assurance, he makes
positive statements in all these respects covering up meta-
physical concern with reference to "miracles" and "ultimate
mysteria." But he seems to be in profound agreement with
Leibniz. "Leibniz was the first great modern thinker to have
a clear insight into the true character of mathematical sym-
bolism," 115 and into the nature of symbolism in general.
For him [Leibniz] the problem of the "logic of things" is insolubly
connected with the problem of the "logic of signs." The "Sctentia gen-
erdu" needs the "Characteristica general**" as its tool and vehicle. The
112 Essay on Man, 228.
118 Essay on Man, 220.
114 PSF, III, 387.
118 Essay on Man, 217 j cf. Erkenntnisfroblem, II, 1425.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 317
latter does not refer to the things, but their representations: it does not
deal with the res but the "notae rerum" But this does not prejudice their
objective content. For that "pre-established harmony" which, in ac-
cordance with the fundamental thought of Leibniz' philosophy, rules
between the world of the ideal and the real: it also connects the world
of signs with that of objective "meanings." The real is subject, without
any limitation, to the ideal. 116
There is no such division between ideal and real world in the
philosophy of Cassirer. Critical philosophy welds the two
worlds into transcendental unity. But the seam appears in the
notion of the symbol. Cassirer cannot help using Leibnizian
language. In that way he slides over the metaphysical problem
which has been put and answered by Leibniz. With Leibniz
the analysis of the real leads to the analysis of the ideas, the analysis of
the ideas to that of the signs. With one stroke therewith the concept
of the symbol has become the spiritual focus, the true center of the
intellectual world. In it the principles of metaphysics and cognition run
together. 117
This very same characteristic can be given of Cassirer's philoso-
phy of symbolic forms; only that the form's metaphysical in-
gredients, by definition, are as metaphysical unknowable.
His philosophy is thus in a way frustrating; one would like to
say, it is so by definition. The quest for a metaphysics "behind"
the symbolic form is invalid. But the question concerning the
nature of that energy, which welds phenomena into structural
totality and thus brings about symbols, is still valid. Its answer
would lead into metaphysics a metaphysics of Leibnizian har-
mony with humanistic emphasis: "the highest, indeed the only
task of all these forms is to unite men!" 11 *
What a new key is sounded here! How much has totality
become harmony and harmony humanism! Human harmony
all over the world presupposes universal symbols. Leibniz was
right: without a Characteristica generalis we shall never find a
Scientia generalis. Modern symbolic logic follows the same
'"/
118 Essay on Man, 129. Italics mine. Whether these forms actually do unite men
is another question. See below notes 132, 133.
3i 8 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
tendency. 119 But therewith the problem of human harmony is
not solved. "In an analysis of human culture we must accept
the facts in their concrete shape, in all their diversity and
divergence." 120 The diversity of produced languages divide
menj the unity of linguistic functions may unite them. Even
more, however, may they become united by a universal logic
of artistic imagination, an aesthetic logic, which is not inferior
to intellectual logic, as was the one constructed by Baum-
garten, 121 but superior to it, extending not only over the whole
surface of things but also sounding the depths of the under-
standing consciousness. Only then will it truly be possible to
"comprehend the world in a moment," to make actual the
brotherhood of man. Science, following the Leibnizian
"Ansatz" has conquered the totality of things. Exact science is
completely under Leibniz's spell. 122 But science has diluted the
metaphysical richness of his method. "For Leibniz the concept
of symbol was so to speak the 'vinculum substantiate? between
his metaphysics and his logic. For modern science it is the
'vmculum substantiate* between logic and mathematics and be-
tween logic and exact natural science." 123 For the author of the
Philosophy of Symbolic Forms this fact implied a distinct prog-
ress and advantage. It was a fascinating discovery to find the
intermediate function between the logical universal and the
concrete individual, 124 the common denominator between ex-
tension and intension, to discover the world of things as a world
of symbols, as representations rather than as objects, 125 and to
rise, in the process of dematerialization, to the pure "conceptual
sign" without any Nebensinn that is to say without any
material appendage, in spite of the necessity of meaning to find
a sensuous substratum for its actualization. 127 But for the author
" 1 ML
lbid.
181 Essay on Man, 136.
, III, 55.
'"PSF, I, tfif.
m PSF, 111,373-
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 319
of An Essay on Man it is different. The fascination of intellec-
tual discovery now seems to have given way to an endeavor of
moral persuasion a development similar to Kant's, although,
in my opinion, less consciously planned for. In the Philosophy
of Symbolic Forms it is the fascinating function of the concept
to refer from the very beginning to the totality of thought, to
the whole of all possible thought formations. 128 Precisely that
which has not happened here or anywhere else is posited as
norm 129 by the concept and is pre-formed in anticipation by the
symbol. 130 The fascination of the Essay on Man is no more the
all comprehensive potentiality of thought but that of man him-
self. The kingdom of the possible must now be actualized by
man. He must make true what has never been true before, his
own total harmonic life. Now a new miracle has to happen: not
the miracle of the concept, "that the simple sensuous material,
by the way in which it is considered, gains a new and manifold
spiritual life}" 131 but a miracle of social life: that the human
material, by the way in which it is considered, gains a new and
manifold spiritual life. Now the question arises, how man's
spiritual creations can reactively ennoble their creator himself.
This is only possible, obviously, if they do not remain merely
intellectual achievements, but take hold of the whole of man's
nature} if culture is integrated by the symbol not only, so to
speak, horizontally, in the totality of its forms, but also in the
person of its creator, vertically, so to speak, to the very founda-
tions of his soul in a word, if man himself is integrated into his
culture. For such an achievement the intellectual logic is not
sufficient. The author of the Essay on Man does no longer
seem to find it so important that the symbolic function is the
vinculum substantiate between logic and mathematics and be-
tween logic and exact natural science. For him it seems now to
be all important that it be the vinculum substantiate between
logic and morality.
It is one of the peculiarities of creation that the works created
128 PSF, m, 39 i.
, 111,370.
PSF, III, i 97 f., 21 if, 234-
m PSF, 1, 27.
320 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
appear as strangers to the creator. Since the essential act of
creation is a subconscious one, the miracle of encompassing the
spiritual in the material takes place in the very depths of the
creating soulj the memory of it is faint, indeed, non-existing,
and the re-cognition of the created as created almost impossible.
Herein lies the fascination of the work for the creator 5 but
herein also the danger of abstracting himself from his creations,
of disintegration between man and culture instead of integra-
tion. The very variety and differentiation of cultural forms, in
which lies the progress of the spirit and in the totality of which
lies its harmony, also makes for differences and separations.
"Thus what was intended to secure the harmony of culture be-
comes the source of the deepest discords and dissensions." 182
This is the great antinomy, the dialectic, not only of the religious
life 133 but of all cultural life. The "process of removal" some-
times "iiberschlagt sich" gets out of hand, and degenerates into
an urge of destruction. The great problem then is how to main-
tain the continuity between the soul of man and his creations,
how to weave him and the symbolic forms into one cultural
pattern, a pattern of morality. When man is identified with his
works, he is moral; for then he is identified with the works of
all mankind. How can that integration be achieved? Again let
us glance at the artist.
Rodin and his works were one.
It was impossible to separate him from his work. His statues were the
states of his soul. Just as Rodin seemed to break the fragments around
the statue away from the block in which it had been concealed, so he
himself seemed to be a sort of rock hiding various forms and crystallized
growths. 184
The symbolic forms are the states of man's soul. "The contents
of culture cannot be separated from the fundamental forms and
directions of spiritual creation: their 'being' cannot be appre-
hended otherwise but as 'doing'." 135 As the sculpture is "con-
cealed" in the block, "pre-existent" in its shape, grain, texture,
*** Essay on Man, 130.
138 Ibid, and Chap. VII.
** Story, op. cit.f n.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 321
"like the chicken in the egg," 136 and the sculptor must "col-
laborate" with the stone to free the figure concealed in it, so
man must "collaborate" with himself to free the symbolic forms
within him and create culture out of himself. Culture is indeed
the process of man's progressive self-liberation. "Language, art,
religion, science, are various phases in this process." 137 Man is
his own "matter" and his own "form." Cassirer's philosophy
here completes and substantiates empirically Kant's "Coperni-
can revolution." Matter and form
are now no more absolute powers of Eemg y but they serve the designa-
tion of certain differences and structures of meaning. The "matter" of
perception, as it was understood by Kant originally, could still appear
as a kind of epistemological counterpart to Aristotle's WP<OTYJ uXiq. Like
it, it is taken as the merely indeterminate before all determination,
which must expect all determination from the form which accrues to
it and imprints itself on it. The situation changes after Kant's own de-
velopment of the "transcendental topic" and his designation, within that
topic, of a definite position to the opposition of "matter" and "form."
Now they are no more primal determinations of Being, ontic entities,
but pure concepts of reflection, which in the section on the "Amphiboly
of the Concepts of Reflection" are being treated on the same line with
Agreement and Opposition, and Identity and Difference. They are
no more two poles of Being in insoluble "real" opposition, 138
but concepts of transcendental comparisons referring to states
of consciousness. They are "states of man's soul." "From the
point of view of phenomenology there is as little a 'matter in
itselP as a 'form in itself there are only total experiences,
which can be compared under the point of view of matter and
form, and determined and articulated accordingly." 139
In the Essay on Man the transcendental "relativization" 140
of the contrast between matter and form has been applied to
man 5 man is the sculptor of the symbolic forms forms of his
own consciousness. But the relationship already appears clearly
in the Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. Indeed, it is the differ-
136 In words of the Spanish sculptor Jose* de Creeft.
187 Essay on Man, 228.
138 m 1 , III, 13.
189 PSF, III, 230.
322 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
entiation of man's "space" by which man actually carves out
the symbolic forms, pre-existent in it. Space is the universal
matrix of these forms and it is a state of man's own con-
sciousness. Plato's rcp&Tov SeKTixdVj space as common matrix of
all determinations, is actually being confirmed by the philoso-
phy of symbolic forms, 141 even though its "space," like Kant's,
is very different from Plato's metaphysical "receptacle." It is a
formative, dynamic principle, indeed, the formative principle
of consciousness itself in its relation to the world the form
of our "outer experience." It is a living "material," living in
and through the life of its shaper, just as is the "stone" of
Rodin. All the symbolic forms have their particular "spati-
ality," 142 their particular form of correlation 148 according to their
particular modality. From empirical perceptual space develops
conceptual space. 144 Perceptual space is already filled with sym-
bolic forms and interpenetrated by them. Language forms the
first space-words. In abstract geometry space is a system of
topological determinations: proximity of points, distance, inter-
section of lines, incidence of planes and spaces. From topologi-
cal develops metric and projective space. The development of
space is at the same time the development of relational thought,
the gradual awakening of consciousness and its world-aware-
ness. 145
There is no power of the spirit which has not co-operated in this gigantic
process of formation. Sensation, intuition, feeling, phantasy, creative
imagination, 146 constructive [!] conceptual thought and the manner
of their interpenetration create each time a new spatial Gestalt.
At the same time there is a definitive direction of the process:
"the ' Auseinanderseteung* between world and ^o" 148 the
1 PSF, m, 49 i.
148 ibid.
144 PSF, m, 49*.
148 Cassirer refers in this connection to Carnap, Rudolf, Der Raum, tin Beitrag
zur Wissenschaftslehre, Berlin, 1922.
14 *The German word "Einbildungskraft" '-"power of in-forming," gives the
spatial implication.
"PSF, III, 493.
148 Italics mine.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 323
progressive "ex-position" and "ex-secution" of the separateness
of man and world, their gradual differentiation. Gradually man
releases space and its forms from and out of himself, until
finally it seems to be an independent Gestalt y standing opposed
to and as counter-pole of him. The mythical consciousness of
space is still entirely woven within the sphere of subjective feel-
ing, but already there appears an opposition of cosmic powers,
as in the Platonic Timaeus, the Chinese Yin and Yang, and the
innumerable forms of "cosmic bisexuality." 149 Language con-
tinues the separation and deepens it: the mythical physiog-
nomic space becomes presentative space. Conceptual mathe-
matical, geometrical, and physical thought complete the proc-
ess: the anthropomorphic conditions are being pushed back in
favor of "objective" determinations which result from the meth-
ods of counting and measuring. Now we have the space of pure
meaning or signification. 150 A similar process of differentiation
takes place within the elemental units of the symbolic forms.
The flux of perceptual impressions is being subdivided into
centers around which the undifferentiated variety clusters, like
the diffuse matter in space, which gradually clustered into nebu-
lae, and continues to concentrate its diffuse matter into condensed
energy "through millions and mountains of millions of cen-
turies." 151 Similarly the process of symbolic formation continues
to concentrate diffuse energies as long as there is man. The
diffuse matter in space is being organized by being referred to a
natural center. Ever new worlds are in formation and "gain a
general relation to the center, the first formative point of crea-
tion." 152 Similarly in the world of symbolic forms centers are
formed as points of reference. Thus the name becomes name
only through reference to such centers. The names "red" or
"blue," for instance, 153 do not mean certain blue or red nuances,
but express the specific manner, in which an undetermined
variety of such nuances is seen as one and conceptually set as
** Treated symbolically in Mann's Joseph novels. Cf. Slochower, Harry, No
Voice is Wholly Lost, New York 1945, 350 n.
PSF, III, 493 f.
"* Kant, Natural History and Theory of the Heavens, 2. Teil, 7tes Hauptstuck.
PSF, 111,497-
324 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
one. 154 In physical-geometrical thought the given is not only
being divided and assembled around fixed centers, but "cast
into form," 155 the harmonious form of mathematical symbols,
which is as opposed to the original diffusion of formative ener-
gies as the well ordered system of planets is to the primal
diffusion of matter. For Laplace Kant's theory of the heavens
was the inspiration for a mathematical theory of the creation
of the world. 156 For Cassirer Kant's theory of knowledge was
the inspiration for a theory of the creation of the cultural world,
one of whose culminations is mathematics. In both cases the
world is modelled in space a work of plastic imagination. 157
If all activity of thought expresses itself in spatial forms, then
its creative activity must needs be a kind of plastic sculpturing.
Cassirer himself has never, to my knowledge, drawn this con-
clusion, but it deduces itself logically from his philosophy.
In sculpturing the world of symbolic forms, man sculptures
and forms his own soul. What he looks at in the variety of
forms is his own inner life. Rodin "used to contemplate his
creations lovingly, and sometimes even seemed to be astonished
and contemplative at the idea of having created them, speaking
as if they existed apart from himself." 158 Thus man stands
wonderingly before his creations, astounded at the world, which
he has created created so unconsciously that it took several
thousand years of contemplative thought until, in the mind of
Kant, he recognized in it himself. This same difficulty veiled
the world of symbolic forms before man's mind in a world of
metaphysics. Again and again man tried to lift the veil, but the
attempt was doomed to pathetic failure. As for Schiller's
"Young Man of Sai's," curiosity could only yield horror: the
look into the abyss of nothing or the abyss of his own self. In
184 "In-eins-gesefon und in-eins-gesetzt." "Einsicht" becomes "Eins-sicW "In-
sight" becomes "One-sight."
** PSF, III, 498.
lw Or might have been, if he knew Kant's treatise. Whether or not he actually
did is unknown.
m Cf . Rodin : "If we can imagine the thought of God in creating the world,
we shall find that He first thought of the modelling, which is the unique principle
in Nature and perhaps of the * planets." Story, of. cit.> 14.
w Story, of, c*t. t n.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 325
a very real sense we are all thinkers pondering "The Gate of
Hell." Thinking is fraught with shocking surprises, shocks
which are dialectic hiatuses in the process of the souPs self-
discovery. That process leads to successive "crises" "separa-
tions" of existence, in which the unconscious and uncontem-
plated process of spiritual development becomes a problem to
itself, in which "Ausserung* becomes "Ausserliches" self-ex-
pression becomes the exterior world. 159 This estrangement of
the symbolic forms from their creator arises from the very
fundamental principle of their creation.
The acts of expression, presentation, and meaning are not immediately
present to themselves, but become apparent only in the totality of their
accomplishment. They are only by confirming themselves, and giving
notice of themselves through their action. They do not originally reflect
on themselves, but they look at the work which they are to execute, to
the reality the valid form of which they are to build up. 160
Hence these forms can only be described within their works
and in the language of these works. Language, myth, art:
each of these exteriorizes its own individual world of creations, which
latter cannot be understood otherwise than as expressions of the self-
activity, the "spontaneity" of the spirit. But this self-activity does not
proceed in the form of free reflection, and therefore remains hidden
to itself. The spirit creates the series of linguistic, mythical and artistic
Gestalten, without in them recognizing itself as creative principle. Thus
each of these series becomes for it an "exterior" world. 161
The free creations of the spirit are then regarded as "things"
and the power and independence of the spirit compelled into
systems of dogmatic concepts. 182 Only the Critical philosophy
succeeds in prying open this dogmatism. The thing, far from
being a self-sufficient being, is for it only "an intellectual partial
condition of being, a single conceptual moment, which only in
the complete system of our knowledge comes to full effect." 168
It is now nothing but the general principle of the series, so to
160 PSF y III, 1 1 8.
m PSF, II, 267. Cf. Erkenntnisfroblem I, 7.
1W Erkenntnisfroblem I, vf.
"/*.
326 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
speak, its general term. 184 The whole of reality is process, and
the things are condensations of that process, much as matter is
in physical field theory. 165 There is now no more metaphysical
absolute, but only becoming. "By regarding the conditions of
science as 'become,' we recognize them precisely thereby as
creations of thought." 166 In doing so we recognize the opposition
of subject and object as a metaphysical artifice, "the charac-
teristic procedure of metaphysics." 167 Thus metaphysics es-
tranges man from his creations} it must be overcome if man
is to become responsible for his culture. It is no wonder, there-
fore, that the most metaphysical people has also fallen victim
to the most tremendous "crisis," the most barbaric separation
of man and culture: what the German scientists of extermina-
tion strove to annihilate was the man-of-culture, 168 termed by
them "the beast of intelligence" "die Intelligenzbestie" In
their scientific one-sidedness they were both "metaphysical"
and barbaric. 169
To overcome this metaphysical crisis man must "collaborate"
with himself as the sculptor does with his material. He must
fuse his own form with his own matter. The metaphysical crisis
must be transformed, through cultural critique, into harmonic
responsibility of man for his world. This is only possible by
man's recognizing in the cultural forms his own consciousness,
by comprehending these forms as symbolic for the unity of
, ill, 3 73 .
165 That theory should, theoretically, be deducible from Kant's Critique of Pure
Reason.
ie * Erkenntnis'problem I, vi.
Substance and Function, 271$ Cf. PSF, I, 24.
""Cf. Kerenyi, Karl, Romandlchtung und Mythologle, Bin Briefwechsel mit
Thomas Mann, Zurich: Rhein Verlag, 1945* 4 2
169 Cf. Bluhm, Heinz, "Ernst Cassirer und die deutsche Philologie," Monats-
hefte filr Dcutsdten Unterrlcht, Vol. XXXVII, No. 7, November 1945, 471.
Ilya Ehrenburg, The Tempering of Russia, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, i944>
276, on examining the diary of a dead German who at the front continued read-
ing philosophy and whose notebook related the philosophy and practice of exter-
mination interspersed with quotations from Plato, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche,
wrote: "In perusing the brown notebook one is amazed at the mental poverty
of these scholarly cannibals. To torture people they need philosophical quotations.
. . . One feels like killing Fritz-the-philosopher twice: one bullet because he tor-
tured Russian children 5 another because after murdering a baby, he read Plato."
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 327
man <md his world. Symbolism is to be the vehicle of man's
morality.
How else should man be able to sound the depths of his own
consciousness and at the same time roam over the width of the
world? The variety of forms would be too manifold for com-
prehension, if there were not the principle of the symbolic
function to organize them. The consciousness would be too
fleetingly incomprehensible, if there were not the material em-
bodiments of its energies. How else should we be able to
penetrate to this purely inner world of consciousness as last concen-
tration of the spiritual, if for its demonstration and description we have
to renounce all the concepts and points of view, which have been created
for the presentation of the concrete reality of things. Where would
there be a means to comprehend the incomprehensible, to express in
any way that which itself has not yet assumed any concrete form
either of the perceptual space and time order, or of an intellectual,
ethical or aesthetic order? If the consciousness is nothing but the pure
potentiality of all the "objective" forms, so to speak the pure receptivity
and preparedness for them, then it cannot be seen how precisely this
potentiality itself can be treated as a fact, indeed, as the primary fact
of all spirituality itself. ... It is obvious that this paradoxical demand
can only be satisfied, if at all, mediately. We can never uncover the
immediate being and life of consciousness purely as such, 170 but it is a
meaningful task to understand the process of objectivation 171
by treating it from a double perspective, shuttling back and
forth between the terminus a quo and the terminus ad quem y
thus truly following the method of that weaver's masterpiece
or, even better, instead of treating the objectivity of the law
rather find the Gestalt 172 of cognition, thus transforming the
method of psychology into that of the symbolic forms.
We start from the problems of the "objective spirit," the Gestalten of
which it consists and in which it exists; but we do not rest there as a
mere fact, but try, through a reconstructive analysis, to penetrate to their
elementary conditions, the "conditions of their possibility." 173
170 In this connection Cassirer's criticism of Berg-son's method is of importance,
PSF, III, 4 2ff.
m PSF, III, 6zf.
m PSF, III, 66.
111 /W, III, 67.
328 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
In other words, we look for the "various forms and crystal-
lized growths" within the rock that is man, and then proceed
to carve them out, helped by our knowledge of the grain and
texture, the geology and palaeontology of those forms. Thus
we would find the correspondence between the manifold of
objective formations and subjective states of consciousness, a
"truly concrete view of the c full objectivity' of the spirit on the
one hand and its 'full subjectivity' on the other." 174 To do so
we must delve down deeply into the roots of consciousness:
We must consider not only the three dimensions of the logical, the
ethical and the aesthetic, but in particular the "form'' of language and
the "form" of mythos, if we want to penetrate down to the primary be-
havioral and formative conditions of consciousness. 175
In this way, then, the vertical integration of man will be
joined to the horizontal integration of his culture. Man must
live on all the levels of his consciousness, on the deepest of
myth as well as on the highest of mathematics, music, 178 and
mysticism. This vertical task has only just begun, but the great
minds of our age are preparing the synthesis. Bergson joins
"mechanics and mysticism," 177 Thomas Mann joins mythos and
language, 178 and asks for a chair in "mythology" to join mythos
and logos. 179 Cassirer joins all spiritual forms in the synthesis
of cultural symbolism.
174 Ibid.
17 ' 1 bid.
178 See above note 85.
177 The Two Sources of Morality and Religion, New York: Henry Holt and
Company, 1935, chapter IV. Bergson's philosophy is based on the form of our
inner experience, time; Cassirer's is based on that of our outer experience, space.
Therefore the latter is led to the central notion of the symbol, which the former
rejects, the former to that of metaphysical intuition which the latter rejects. Cas-
sirer's philosophy can be understood in terms of the plastic arts, Bergson's in terms
of music. A synthesis of both philosophies would be the true philosophy of sym-
bolism.
""Kerenyi, of. '/., 50. According to Cassirer, PSF, I, 268, language as a form
is between mythos and logos.
179 Kerenyi, op. cit. t 84, 82. The separation of the myth from logos is the
immediate cause of the latest world catastrophe. The combination of both, in
particular of mythos with the science of psychology, is one of the guarantees of
the future. "I have long been a passionate friend of this combination j for indeed,
psychology is the means to take the myth out of the hands of the fascist obscurants
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 329
In this way he has given us a tool, a "grammar of the sym-
bolic function," 180 a key with which to open the treasure house
of our own culture. But simply to open it and wander around
in it as in a museum will not solve the crisis. We must appropri-
ate all the symbolic forms as our own creations. The symbols
must not remain mute and dumb signs for us, but be charged
with all the meaning of life. We must enter into their own
lives and live on their level. Our survival depends on our ca-
pacity to handle symbols in communication, discussion, and
agreement in settling conflicts by handling symbols rather
than the powers they stand for. We must "do away with pres-
ence in order to penetrate to representation. . . . The regress
into the world of signs is the preparation for that decisive break-
through in which the spirit will conquer its own world, the
world of idea." 1 * 1
We are standing before that decisive event. We must either
live through symbols or die in the flesh. The symbols will be
filled with life if they reach through our entire self, far above
and below the merely intellectual level. We must recognize the
states of our soul in them, as did Rodin in his creations j "he was
the companion of these white mute creatures of his, he loved
them and entered into their abstract lives." 182 So we must enter
the life of human culture and lovingly develop it and us in it.
In this sense the philosophy of symbolic forms may be said to
be a comprehensive aesthetics, the work of an artist for artists:
the vision of man as creator of all his works, the vision of culture
as human creation. Indeed, it seems that Cassirer himself has
had that vision very consciously 5 the volume on Aesthetics was
to be the crowning volume of the Philosophy of Symbolic
Forms It is the crisis itself that has separated Cassirer from
and to 'transfunction* it into the humane. That combination actually represents
to me the world of the future, a humanity, that is blessed from on high, through
the spirit, and *f rom the depths that lie below'." Thomas Mann, Kerenyi j op. cit.,
82. Cf. Buxton, Charles Roden, Prophets of Heaven and Hell, Virgil, Dante, Mil-
ton, Goethe, Cambridge: At the University Press, 1945, 2$L +
** pg p T _ a
181 PSF, III, 3*561 54- Cf. Ill, 330.
182 Story, op. cit., n.
183 Bluhm, op. cit., 468. PSF, I, 120.
330 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
the symbolic forms of the arts 5 his book could not be written
"due to the unfavorable political conditions." Otherwise he
himself might have performed that vertical synthesis of man
and cast man's inner life into the forms of the new logic. Maybe
he would have called that new form the form of man's "sym-
bolic Pr'dgnanz" man's existence as symbol of his own uni-
versal thought: transcending his material confinement in uni-
versal meaning.
How Cassirer would have integrated man himself into his
culture we can only guess. He has given us one lowly example
for symbolic Pragnanz: he integrates the life of a wavy line in
all fields of meaning. Let us quote that passage, not only as a
symbolic review of the whole philosophy of symbolic forms, its
artistic empathy and the sweep of its meaning, but also as a pre-
view into realms to which Cassirer's philosophy points.
In the purely spatial determination there is a peculiar "mood," the up
and down of lines in space contains an inner motion, a dynamic rise
and fall, a psychic being and life. It is not we who feel our own inner
states in a subjective way in the spatial form: but that form presents
itself to us as a spirited whole, an independent manifestation of life.
Its steady and calm flow or its sudden break, its roundness and whole-
ness or its brokenness, its hardness or softness : all this appears as character
of its own being, its objective "nature." But all this recedes and seems
as if it were annihilated and extinguished as soon as the line is taken in
another meaning as a mathematical design, a geometrical figure. Now
it becomes a mere scheme, the means of presenting a universal geometric
law. Where before we had the up and down of a wavy line and in it
the harmony of an inner mood there now we find the graphic pres-
entation of a trigonometric function, a curve the whole content of which
is absorbed in its analytic formula. The spatial Gestalt is nothing else
now than the paradigm of that formula; it is only the hull into which
a mathematical thought, imperceptible in itself, is clothed. And the latter
does not stand by itself, but in it a universal law presents itself, the
order of space in general. Every single geometric form is by virtue of
that order connected with the totality of all other spatial forms. It
belongs to a certain system an aggregate of "truths" and "theorems,"
of "reasons" and "consequences" and that system denotes the universal
form by which each individual geometric figure is alone possible, that is
to say, constructable and "understandable." And again the situation is
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 331
different, when we consider the line as mythical sign or as aesthetic
ornament. The mythical sign expresses the fundamental mythical con-
trast between the "holy" and the "profane." It is established in order
to separate these two realms from each other, to warn and to terrify and
to bar the uninitiated from approaching or entering the holy. And
thereby it does not function only as a mere sign, as a mark by which the
holy is being recognized; but it possesses a magically compelling and re-
pelling power, which resides in it objectively. Of such a compulsion the
aesthetic world knows nothing. Contemplated as an ornament the line
is removed both from the sphere of "meaning" in the logico-conceptual
sense as that of magico-mythical significance and warning. It now
possesses its import in itself, which uncovers itself only in the purely
artistic contemplation, the aesthetic intuition as such. Here again the
experience of the spatial form completes itself only through belonging to
a total horizon and opening that horizon up for us, ... by standing in a
certain atmosphere, in which it not only simply "is," but in which it
so to speak lives and breathes. 184
Imagine the hero of this tale to be man rather than a wavy
line! How he would be seen in all realms of meaning, all forms
of culture a symbol himself of his own striving and achieve-
ment, the central system of co-ordination of all life activities.
"The symbolic process is like a unique life and thought current
which flows through consciousness and which in its flowing
motion alone brings about the variety and continuity of con-
sciousness in all its fullness." 185 In the unity of that flow man
would become integrated, from the mythical depth of con-
sciousness the well of the past from which Thomas Mann
brought forth his Joseph figures 186 to the highest height of
mathematics, music, and mysticism. 187
181 PSF, III, 231 j Cf. Cassirer "Das Symbolproblem und seine Stellung im Sys-
tem der Philosophic," Zeitschrift fur Asthettk und, allgemeine Kumtwissenschajt,
Bd. XXI, 191 ff. Cf. supra 112 f.
185 PSF, III, 234-
188 Cf . Thomas Mann on the combination of psychology and myth in Kerenyi,
op. cit., 82$ also "Freud and the Future," in Freud, Goethe, Wagner, New York:
Alfred A. Knopf, 1942, 298.
** For then the process of objectivation would not be completed in the mathe-
matical symbols symbols for nature rather than for human nature. It may be
that those symbols will also aid in the objectivation of man toward himself, the
objectivation of his own psyche: his emotions and desires. Perhaps Spinoza was
332 ROBERT S. HARTMAN
So far the highest realms of the vertical synthesis have not
been reached. Cassirer's work is unfinished and waits for com-
pletion. The mysticism of the artist, the musicality of the mathe-
matician, all these are symbolic forms and elaborations of lower
forms as truly as mathematics is the elaboration of the lower
symbolic forms of myth and language. Perhaps Cassirer had
intended to show us these connections in his projected volume
on the symbolic forms of Aesthetics. As it is, the work must
be completed by us, the epigones. But we too shall only be
precursors, preparers of the day "when the human intelligence,
elevated to its perfect type, shall shine forth glorified in some
future Mozart-Dirichlet or Beethoven-Gauss." 188 Cassirer's
work points toward a future of symbolic forms so rich that
man's present culture appears very primitive indeed.
In 1910, at about the time when Cassirer's first great work
appeared, another great mind was concerned with the future.
Leo Tolstoy, shortly before his death, dictated to his daughter
Anastasia a strange prophecy. He predicted the coming of
world wars, the sway of a strange figure from the North, "a
new Napoleon," and finally, a "federation of the United States
of nations." After that
I see a change in religious sentiment. . . . The ethical idea has almost
vanished. Humanity is without the moral feeling. But then a great re-
former arises. ... I see the peaceful beginning of an ethical era. . . .
In the middle of this century I see a hero of literature and art rising . . .
and purging the world of the tedious stuff of the obvious. It is the light
of symbolism that shall outshine the torch of commercialism*
Cassirer's life was dedicated to the self-liberation of man
through symbolism. Everything for him, like for Rodin, 190
on the right road with his geometric ethics. But the "grammar of emotions" may
have to be written, ultimately in a more fitting script: that of musical and mysti-
cal symbolism. To the latter point see Essay on Man, 102. Concerning the in-
sufficiency of mathematical symbolism even for the comprehension of nature cf.
Cassirer, "Goethe and Kantian Philosophy" in Rousseau, Kant, Goethe, 64.8., 8 if.
388 James Joseph Sylvester in a paper on Newton's rule for the discovery of
imaginery roots of algebraic equations, quoted from . T. Bell, Men of Mathe-
matics, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1937, 4O4f.
1S9 Forman, Henry James, The Story of Prophecy, New York: Tudor Publish-
ing Company: 1939, 25 3 f.
190 Story, of. cit., 17.
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 333
was "idea and symbol j" like Rodin "he sought in the energy
of the human body and its symbolism for the origins of all re-
ligions, all philosophy and poetry." 191 The ethical era to come
must be built to a large extent on his work. His morality was,
like Rodin's, 192 the comprehensive love of life and of all its
forms. Rodin "opened a vast window in the pale house of
modern statuary, and made of sculpture, which had been a
timid, compromised art, one that was audacious and full of
life." 193 So Cassirer opened a large window in the pale house
of modern critical philosophy and made of epistemology, which
had been a timid, compromised discipline, one that was auda-
cious and full of life. He prepared the horizontal-vertical
integration of man's soul and culture a symbolic cross, to
which man will not be fixed in agony, but in which he will live.
ROBERT S. HARTMAN
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY
2 Story, op. cit., n.
9
Folke Leander
FURTHER PROBLEMS SUGGESTED BY THE
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS
FURTHER PROBLEMS SUGGESTED BY THE
PHILOSOPHY OF SYMBOLIC FORMS
ONE should take everything for what it is, not criticize it
for not being what it is not" such was the critical maxim
of the Swedish poet-philosopher Thomas Thorild (1759-1806),
on whom, incidentally, Cassirer has written an excellent book.
It is, however, exceedingly difficult to criticize Cassirer for
what he does say, and much easier to point to the unsolved
problems which he never set out to solve. Cassirer's method in
The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms is that of concentrating his
attention on a very limited number of major problems, treating
them exhaustively, adducing a great wealth of linguistic, mytho-
logical, and psychological material to prove his point. The
numerous and widespread errors he refutes are disproved very
thoroughly. He rarely "sticks his neck out," as the Americans
say. There is a certain finality about all this and little tempta-
tion for the student to quote a passage and disagree with it. In
fact, if you accept the view that all thought, in so far as it is
really thought, must necessarily be true, all criticism must con-
sist in drawing attention to omissions. Only, in Cassirer's case
you rarely find the omissions mixed up with and vitiating what
he does say, which latter will generally be found to be unim-
peachable, as far as it goes. These introductory remarks may
serve to explain the nature of the following pages, which are
intended primarily to point to further problems suggested by
Cassirer's philosophy. The problems suggested are: i) the uni-
fication of the pre-scientific symbolic forms; 2) a more careful
distinction between form and material j 3) an analysis of the
logic of history and the logic of philosophy. I will try to show
how these desiderata grew out of Cassirer's own philosophy.
337
338 FOLKE LEANDER
I
The Unification of the Pre-Scientific Symbolic Forms
As Theodor Litt 1 has remarked, the whole of Cassirer's
philosophy of symbolic forms may be regarded as a synthesis
of Kant and Herder, or as an adoption into the former's phi-
losophy of the wider sphere of interest represented by the latter.
Kant's epistemology, devised to explain the possibility of New-
tonian physics, must be broadened so as to include aesthetics,
the theory of language, and the philosophy of mythology. It
is high time for epistemologists to rid themselves of the superior
attitude often taken towards language, myth, and especially art,
as if these things did not concern them. As Cassirer shows they
are the basis of our knowing life, the basis upon which even
science rests. Cassirer has admirably instructive studies of two of
the pre-scientific symbolic forms, language and myth. There is,
however, no volume on art, and this fact is seldom mentioned.
So far so good. We have every reason to be grateful for
these excellent books. Yet one should like to know more about
the way these pre-scientific symbolic forms are related to one
another. How does Cassirer know there are three of them?
How does he arrive at them? He simply takes over the popu-
lar delimitations without caring about the objections that
myth may be a mixture of artistic imagination and practical emo-
tion of a certain kind, and language a crudely delimited type of
art or, alternatively, art a crudely delimited type of language.
He projects the idea that aesthetics is the general science of
pre-scientific symbolism ; but he rejected it without anything re-
sembling real disproof. 2
In Sfrache und Mythos (Leipzig 1925), pp. 65!?., he dis-
cusses at length the relations of language, myth and art. He
begins by pointing out that language and myth have "a com-
mon root" and are the products of an ultimately identical
mental function (eine lefote Gemeinsamkeit in der Fwnktion
des Gestaltens). They are both the products of "metaphorical
thinking." He quotes from Max Muller: "Whether he wanted
1 Kant und Herder als Deuter der geistigen Welt, Leipzig (1930), 285 f.
* Die Sfrache, Berlin (1923), 12 of.
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 339
to or not, man had to speak in metaphors, not because he could
not restrain his poetic imagination, but rather because he had
to use it to the utmost in order to find expressions for the ever-
growing needs of his mind." The growth of intuition, accord-
ingly, is correlative to the growth of poetic symbolism. The
common root of language and myth turns out also to be the
root of poetryj in fact, we are told, they are originally one,
and the distinctions between them were gradually introduced.
"Myth, language and art begin as a concrete, undivided unity,
which is only gradually resolved into a triad of independent
modes of spiritual creativity." 3
The critic will remark that there are distinctions and dis-
tinctions they need not all be of the same kind. Some may be
fundamental and "real," whereas others are "merely empirical,"
more or less arbitrary cuts in a flowing continuum. Cassirer's
Kantianism will scarcely allow him to put the distinctions be-
tween abstract and concrete, or theoretical and practical, moral
good and sensuous satisfaction on a level with the arbitrary dis-
tinction between, say, a chair and a sofa, where all sorts of
intermediary forms are conceivable. It is a question of logic
whether you accept "real" distinctions as ultimately different
from "merely empirical" or "pragmatic" ones. But whatever
your ultimate decision on this point of logic will be, you will
certainly have to admit a difference of status. Now the critic
may maintain that the distinctions gradually emerging between
language, myth, and art are of the "merely empirical" variety
and that pre-scientifi.c symbolism is "really" the same activity
everywhere.
Cassirer describes the creation of myth and language in the
very terms in which others describe the process of artistic crea-
tion. Myth arises from an emotional tension between man and
his environment:
then the spark jumps somehow across, the tension finds release, as the
subjective excitement becomes objectified, and confronts the mind as a
god or a daemon. . . . 4 As soon as the spark has jumped across, as soon
as the tension and emotion of the moment has found its discharge in
9 Language and Myth (S. Langer translation, 1945), 98.
33-
340 FOLKE LEANDER
the word as the mythical image, a sort of turning point has occurred in
human mentality: the inner excitement which was a mere subjective
state has vanished, and has been resolved into the objective form of
myth or of speech. 5
If anything can be objected to in this statement, it is that the
additional practical emotion characteristic of myth is here over-
looked in favour of a complete identification with art. The
subjective practical emotion is never completely expressed in
the mythical image, as is the case in pure art, but remains as
terror and awe; and to this is added the practical act of "belief."
There is a profound difference between scientific symbolism
on the one hand, and pre-scientific symbolism on the other.
The function of the latter, according to Cassirer, is intuitive
elaboration of experience (Intensivierung is his own term),
whereas the former aims at discursive mastery, by means of
rules and procedures, of a world already intuitively appre-
hended. Science moves on the discursive level, the level of gen-
eral concepts (Allgemeinbegriffe} and laws. But this level of
rationality could not exist by itself and must everywhere attach
itself to something more basic. The intuitive level of experience
is experience elaborated by means of linguistic, mythical, and
artistic symbolism. 6
*., 3 6.
8 In myth, says Cassirer, "thought does not dispose freely over the data of
intuition, in order to relate and compare them to each other, but is captivated and
enthralled by the intuition which suddenly confronts it. It comes to rest in the
immediate experience j the sensible present is so great that everything else dwindles
before it." (Ibid. y 32.) ". . . the immediate content, whatever it be, that commands
his religious interest so completely fills his consciousness that nothing else can exist
beside and apart from it. The ego is spending all its energy on this single object,
lives in it, loses itself in it." (Ibid., 33.) This would also be an excellent description
of the aesthetic attitude, the common element being intuitive elaboration, or
"Intensivierung," of experience.
"Language and myth stand in an original and indissoluble correlation with one
another, from which they both emerge but gradually as independent elements. They
are two diverse shoots from the same parent stem, the same impulse of symbolic
formulation, springing from the same basic mental activity, a concentration and
heightening of simple sensory experience. In the vocables of speech and in primitive
mythic figurations, the same inner process finds its consummation: they are both
resolutions of an inner tension, the representation of subjective impulses and
excitations in definite objective forms and figures." (Ibid., 88.) Can anyone fail
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 341
The sharp distinction between the two levels of experience
discursive and intuitive does not imply, of course, that mean-
ings belong merely to the discursive level. There are also mean-
ings on the intuitive level, though of a different kind. They
may be termed "felt identities/' "affinities," "qualia," "char-
acters}" as caught and held in symbols, Cassirer terms them
"Sfrachbegriffe," "mythische Begriffe," etc.
It appears, then, that language, myth, and art have a common
task in the theoretical life of man, namely, the intuitive mastery
of experience. This would seem to make it imperative to dis-
criminate between the theoretical and the practical-emotional
aspects of myth, in which case the former could hardly fail to
be identified with art. A similar failure to distinguish between
the theoretical and the practical vitiates Cassirer's use of the
term "expressional phenomenon," by which he means the emo-
tional qualities of phenomena. In so far as emotion is subservient
to intuition, it is aesthetic} but it may also obstruct the intuitive
elaboration of experience and may then be called practical.
Practical emotional qualities are stimuli to immediate practical
reaction: we give up the attitude of contemplation, of intuitive
elaboration. Thus sudden fear, if detrimental to intuition, is
practical, whereas the grandiose, the sublime and even the ter-
rible may be aesthetic qualities. The distinction is blurred by the
use of the term "expressional qualities" no less than in the
phrases current among English-speaking philosophers: "terti-
ary qualities" and the like.
One should also note that the function Cassirer ascribes to
language is intuitive mastery of experience. For one of the
things that have evidently puzzled him most, is the "logical"
element of language. But, when raising this problem, he in-
variably makes a metabasis eis allo genos and passes from pre-
to see that this is a perfect description of the process of artistic creation? Could
there be a better proof that myth and language are aesthetic products?
If discursive thinking "tends toward expansion, implication, and systematic
connection, the verbal and mythical conception tends toward concentration, tele-
scoping, separate characterization." (Ibid., 56.) "Here thought does not confront
its data in an attitude of free contemplation, seeking to understand their structure
and their systematic connections, and analyzing them according to their parts and
functions, but is simply captivated by a total impression." (Ibid., 57.)
342 FOLKE LEANDER
scientific to scientific symbolism, asserting that the same
"Logos" that is operative in scientific symbolism, is also at work
in pre-scientific symbolism. If we ask what is here meant by
Logos, we find that several different meanings are crowded
together into one term. "Logos" may mean spiritual synthesis
in general: and in this case it is, of course, true that Logos is
operative in pre-scientific symbolism. But Logos may also mean
the thinking of scientific and general concepts: and in this case
it can be shown, I think, that Logos is altogether outside of in-
tuition and of pre-scientific symbolism, although it may leave
results that may be absorbed in the latter. (I shall explain pres-
ently what is meant by the last clause.)
As we have seen, meanings, according to Cassirer, are found
also on the intuitive level; as caught and held in linguistic
symbols they are "Sfrachbegriffe" not to be confused with
general or scientific concepts. When he asserts that the same
Logos is operative in the creation of "S-prachbe griff eP which
on a higher level is operative in the creation of scientific con-
cepts, this assertion is only acceptable if Logos means Geist in
general. But Cassirer also means that "Sprachbegriffe" are a
confused and preliminary creation of Logos in the sense of
scientific intellect. This latter assertion seems to me untenable.
The confusion is made possible by the fact that general and
scientific concepts may be "absorbed" into intuition. An electric
charge is one thing for the engineer in his capacity of scientific
specialist 5 it is a different thing for the layman and even for
the engineer himself qua non-specialist. What was originally
a mere formula, a rule of procedure, may through practice and
experience of its effects be transformed into an intuitive affinity,
a quale, a Gestalt, a characteristic physiognomy. As John Dewey
puts it:
In the situation which follows upon reflection, meanings are intrinsic;
they have no instrumental or subservient office, because they have no
office at all. They are as much qualities of the objects in the situation as
are red and black, hard and soft, square and round. And every re-
flective experience adds new shades of such intrinsic qualifications. 7
1 Essays in Experimental Logic, (1916) 17. Cf. also How We Think, (1933),
135 ff. ("Things and Meanings")* and Logic, (1938) ch. VIII ("Immediate
Knowledge").
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 343
Perhaps Dewey's term "intrinsic qualifications" is better than
any of those I have so far used (affinity, physiognomy, quale,
etc.). Discursive procedures, then, may grow intuitive, ideas
may lose their intellectual quality by habitual use. And, as a
parallel process, general and scientific concepts may be trans-
formed into "Sfrachbegriffe" Dewey distinguishes between
two types of grasp of meaning: the strictly logical type and the
"aesthetic" perception of intrinsic qualifications, which is some-
times called acquaintance-knowledge. We apprehend chairs,
tables, books, trees, horses, stars, rain, etc., promptly and di-
rectly $ we need not think about these things in order to identify
them; we cannot help seeing them as chairs, tables, etc.
Certainly logical thought-processes leave results in intuition j
the starry heavens, for instance, look different to us from what
they did to a contemporary of Dante. But there is also a move-
ment in the opposite direction. "Red" meant originally an in-
tuitively felt affinity j but when definite procedures have been
developed, e.g. y the colour-pyramid, it may mean a loom
within the system.
In spite of all this give and take, however, the intuitive and
the discursive levels remain different. Since the aim and func-
tion of "Sfrachbegriffe?* is altogether different from that of
general and scientific concepts, the former cannot be viewed as
an inferior and undeveloped variety of the latter. Yet the inter-
play between the levels is certainly misleading. On the intuitive
level, Cassirer says, meanings are "fused" (eingeschmolzen)
with the concrete. 8 And he paints a picture of the poor Logos
like a butterfly grovelling in the dust, until in science it dis-
engages itself from the many-coloured intuition, rises into the
air, and starts out on a proud flight in its own proper element. 9
1 Phanomenologie der Erkenntiris, (1929), 327.
9 Phanomenologie der Erkenntms, 395!. "It is true that an abyss appears to yawn
between the scientific concept and the verbal concept however, looked at more
closely this abyss is exactly the same gulf which thinking had to bridge earlier
before it could become verbal thought. . . . Now thought has to tear loose not
merely from the here and now, from the respective location and moment, but it
has to reach beyond the totality of space and time, beyond the limits of perceptual
description, and of description and describability in general. . . . The Vehicle* of
word-language which served for so long a time, will now bear him no farther-
but he feels himself strong and powerful enough to risk the flight which is to
carry him to a new goal."
344 FOLKE LEANDER
But this metaphor is objectionable. The Logos flying discur-
sively in the air is different from that working intuitively within
experience. Both are needed $ but the intuitive Logos is no
preliminary variety of the scientific Logos.
This panlogistic tendency is incompatible with the main
body of Cassirer's thought. For he teaches that language is in
essence intuitive elaboration (Intensvolerung) of experience.
And he also teaches that the "logical" element of language, in
so far as "Sprachbegriffe" are concerned, should not be called
logical at all, if we distinguish between an intuitive and a dis-
cursive, logical level of experience. Language is correlative to
intrinsic qualifications, characters, physiognomies, qualia, affini-
ties, or whatever term may be used for the meanings belonging
to the intuitive level.
All this, the critic will add, proves that language is essentially
an aesthetic activity. Of course, in reasoning language is the
bearer of logical meanings; yet even pure mathematics has
an aesthetic side, since it is an existential thought-process. The
mathematical concepts are embodied in aesthetically meaningful
concrete processes. Words, says Cassirer, are mere "signs" or
"vehicles" of logical meanings. 10 The relation between intuitive
meanings and language is that of vital incarnation. Words ex-
press intuitive meanings but state y or are mere signs of, logical
meanings. On the intuitive level, says Cassirer, "the word which
denotes that thought content is not a mere conventional symbol,
but is merged with its object in an indissoluble unity." 11 If the
lightning is seen as a snake, it will also be called "the snake of
"For it is precisely the 'Logos/ which was at work from the beginning in the
creation of language, which, in the progress to scientific knowledge, frees itself
from the limiting conditions which originally clung to it which proceeds from
its implicit form into its explicit form." (Ibid. y 388)
10 "For theoretical thinking, a word is essentially a vehicle serving the funda-
mental aim of such ideation: the establishment of relationships between the given
phenomenon and others which are "like" it or otherwise connected with it according
to some co-ordinating law. . . . The word stands, so to speak, between actual
particular impressions, as a phenomenon of a different order, a new intellectual
dimension) and to this mediating position, this remoteness from the sphere of
immediate data, it owes the freedom and ease with which it moves among specific
objects and connects one with another." Language and Myth, (Langer tr.) 56f.
11 Language and Myth, 58.
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 345
the sky:" intuitive elaboration and linguistic naming is here one
and the same activity. "The spiritual excitement caused by some
object which presents itself in the outer world furnishes both
the occasion and the means of its denomination. Sense impres-
sions . . . naturally strive for vocal expression." 12 Language and
intuition are correlative and develop together. Intuitive mean-
ings are vitally fused with intuition, and so they are fused with
language. Scientific and general concepts, on the other hand,
are externally related to intuition and have a corresponding
status in its correlative, language. Since this is Cassirer's own
view, why does he reject the aesthetic theory of language? He
not only rejects it but misrepresents it as wanting to reduce
language to mere animal expression, to mere "naturliche Sym-
bolik" mere "Laut der Emfindung." But surely nothing of
the sort has been meant by those who have held the theory in
question.
A significant omission is Cassirer's failure to mention Baum-
garten in his survey of the history of the philosophy of lan-
guage. Certainly his view of oratio sensitive as correlative to
cognitio sensitiva t or intuition, is worthy of close attention. The
"distinct" concepts, Leibniz had said, are exemplified in our
conceptual methods of recognizing objects as belonging to a
class; but there is also an intuitive way of recognizing them.
We immediately see chairs as chairs and feel no need of pro-
ceeding by rule. This is the level of "clear but confused" cate-
gories, i.e. y of everyday intuition and, as Baumgarten pointed
out, in its most intense form the level of art. For art is perfectio
cognition/is semitivae y qua talis. In the same way, ordinary
speech is inherently aesthetic, oratio sensitiva, although the
word poetry is reserved for its more intense form, oratio sensi-
tiva ferfecta. What Baumgarten means by "sensitive" speech
might be freely expressed as follows. The nature of speech is
that of "painting a picture" of something, e.g., of something
I want you to do, or of the field where the point is localized
on which I want you to give me information. Of course, the
analogy with painting must not be pressed: it only lays hold of
18 Ibid.) 89. H. Usener, as quoted by Cassirer.
18 Ibid., 3 of. Cf. also Zur Logik der Kulturwtsstnscfaften, 37^ '
346 FOLKE LEANDER
the fact that the function of speech is that of conjuring up some-
thing concrete, however "thin," schematic, and bare of details
it may be. Even a newspaper headline is oratio sensitiva, al-
though ordinarily very far from ferfecta.
It is strange that Cassirer, the distinguished Leibnizian
scholar, should have made no use of the philosophy of lan-
guage proposed by Baumgarten, the founder of aesthetics. Here
is a perfect distinction between the conceptual and the intuitive
levels of experience. The "affinities" or general "characters"
belonging to the latter level are accounted for as "confused
concepts." And language is seen to be the correlative of intui-
tion. All this returns in Cassirer's own philosophy, even the
doubtful part of Leibniz-Baumgarten, namely, the view of
intuitive reason as an imperfect and preliminary form of scien-
tific reason. Only Baumgarten's insight into the fundamentally
aesthetic nature of intuition and language has fallen out of the
picture. I believe it will have to be re-introduced.
II
A More Careful Distinction between Form and Material
One may note in Cassirer a certain attachment to what Dewey
has termed "the museum conception of art." Dewey holds the
view that any experience to the extent to which it is an experi-
ence, is aesthetic 14 an idea that goes back to Baumgarten,
Herder, and the romantics. From this point of view a "tran-
scendental aesthetics" would not be the doctrine of mathemati-
cal time and space but simply aesthetics. The subjects dealt with
by Kant at the end of his system, in the Critique of Judgment,
would be placed at the very beginning of the system. Or rather,
since all rationality is "absorbed" and all practical emotion is
expressed in intuition, the doctrine of intuition would be at
once at the end and at the beginning of the system, which would
accordingly be as circular as experience itself: Theodor Litt
says that if Kant had ever discovered real intuition as some-
thing very different from mathematical tiipe and space, he
would hardly have failed to place art on this level ; and further,
14 Art at Experience, (x 934) .
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 347
"he could not have been able to escape the insight which
dominated a Herder, namely that aesthetic experiences stand
by no means alone in this regard, but rather constitute the
highest intensification of the spiritual situation which runs
through all and every sensory world view." 16 In short, the true
"transcendental aesthetics" is simply aesthetics; intuition and its
correlative, the pre-scientific symbolism, may be divided and
subdivided in many ways by means of "merely empirical" dis-
tinctions, but "really" it is one identical activity everywhere
an activity, which in its more intense form is recognized as
aesthetic. A division of our intuitive acts into "more intense"
and "less intense" would itself be merely empirical. "We all
take some pleasure," says Dr. Barnes, "in seeing how things
look, in observing their colour, their contour, their movement,
whether they are moving in our direction or not. In so far as
we are successful in finding what is characteristic, appealing,
or significant in the world about us, we are, in a small im-
promptu way, ourselves artists." 16 He adds that "the artist
differs from the ordinary person partly by his ability to make
what he sees a public object, but chiefly in the range and depth
of his vision itself." 17 A novelist spending weeks and months on
working out a "great" intuition, merely intensifies an activity
in which we are all engaged. We all want clarity of vision and
imaginative interpretation of experience. As Cassirer points out,
the poet does not "know" what he wants to say, until he has
said it; he obscurely feels something working within him, but
he does not know what, until he has defined it in a work of
art. 18 Similarly, it might be added, workmen had no "class-
consciousness" until Marx and others created their "myths" (as
Sorel would say) ; surely there were all sorts of obscure feelings
among the workmen, but they were not articulated. In the
same way, we are all dependent upon poets, prophets and
artists for our imaginative interpretation of experience. There
is no difference of kind between our everyday intuitive activities
v Kant und Herder, 61 .
M Albert C. Barnes: The Art in Painting, 3rd ed. (1937) 12.
"Ibid., 13.
* Zur Logik der Kulturwissenschaften, 1 30.
348 FOLKE LEANDER
and those of the great "seers," merely a difference of intensity
and degree. Just as the science of biology deals with cells as
well as elephants, so the science of intuition deals with everyday
intuitive awareness, however insignificant, as well as with those
greater intuitions recognized as aesthetic.
Anyone who takes such a broad view of aesthetics will almost
inevitably be led to look upon the division of Art into various
arts and genres as "merely empirical" distinctions. Surely the
distinction between art and science is "real" in a sense in which
the distinctions between various arts are superficial and "prag-
matic." Cassirer on the other hand, not having freed himself
entirely from the "museum" idea of art, believes that the main
arts and genres are a priori, inherent in the very idea, the "cate-
gory" of art. I do not know whether or not Cassirer would
nowadays accept the "panaesthetic" conception of experience.
But, even if he does, he will certainly cling to his view of cer-
tain major arts as a priori, categorically (not merely em-
pirically) distinct.
The objections to such a view seem to me very strong. After
all, a human race may be conceived having neither eyes nor ears
and yet endowed with a type of experience resembling our own
in certain general traits. Their art would be very different from
ours. Further, new arts constantly arise in the course of his-
tory. Painting grew out of Byzantine mosaics j sculpture was
originally an integral part of architecture both may be an
integral part of town-planning; music had no existence apart
from song, etc. Recent arts are the movies and the radio drama.
Art is the activity of organizing a material so as to be pleasing
in perception so as to give the perceiver an integral, rounded
"experience." Since any material or combination of materials
may be shaped into beauty, the number of artistic media is in
principle unlimited. To what art belong good manners, a per-
sonal style of dressing and talking, pleasant conversation the
sort of aesthetic shaping that we all practice daily? Are they
one art or several arts? It might seem as if all the means used
to give a total unified impression ought to be considered one
art. Song is not a combination of two arts, poetry plus music,
like one cake put upon another. In dancing to music, the move-
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 349
ments and the music are fused into one organic whole $ the
division into two arts is "merely empirical," whereas the
aesthetic reality is an integral whole. When the Greeks painted
their statues, this was not a simple addition of two arts. A
church service, in so far as it is an aesthetic experience, is a
whole, although numerous media may be empirically distin-
guished. Man, says Schiller, "soil alles Inner veraussern und
alles Aussere formen" The emphasis should be put upon
"alles Aussere" all materials can be shaped into beauty, the
possible media are infinite in number. Historical traditions arise,
certain media become traditional like colours on canvas or theat-
rical representation. But there are always numerous media
which do not fit into the classifications based upon the more
important traditions. Dewey asks:
What can such classifications make out of sculpture in relief, high and
low, of marble figures on tombs, carved on wooden doors and cast in
bronze doors? What about carvings on capitals, friezes, cornices, cano-
pies, brackets? How do the minor arts fit in, workings in ivory, alabaster,
plaster-paris, terra-cotta, silver and gold, ornamental iron work in brack,
ets, signs, hinges, screens and grills? 19
All classifications can here be made, since the materials are a
continuum with all sorts of intermediary forms and endless
overlappings and combinations. If we distinguish between aes-
thetic "form" and the "material" formed, it seems evident
that the differences between the various arts and genres belong
altogether to the material side and leave aesthetic form un-
affected.
If one were to accept such a theory, Cassirer objects,
one would, by so doing, be led to the strange conclusion that, by
calling Beethoven a great musician, Rembrandt a great painter, Homer
a great epic poet, Shakespeare a great dramatist, only inconsequential
empirical marginal conditions were expressed by such assertions, con-
ditions aesthetically quite unimportant and for their characteristics as
artists entirely superfluous. 20
In the same way, one might argue, it is no indifferent matter
w Art as Experience, p. 223.
20 Zw Logik der Kulturwissensckaften, p. 130.
350 FOLKE LEANDER
that Ariosto wrote a romance and Virgil an epic, or that
D. G. Rossetti wrote sonnets and Wordsworth long poems as
well as short. No such things are indifferent or rather, the
one important thing, to which everything adds up, is that
Wordsworth was Wordsworth and Rossetti was Rossetti. Of
course, it is no matter of indifference that Shakespeare wrote
for the stage, or, in brief, all such circumstances added together,
that Shakespeare was Shakespeare. Yet aesthetically the essen-
tial point is that the stage as a traditional medium belonged to
the "material" side of his works of art, not to their "formal"
side. And on the material side there are no barriers between
media they may merge by insensible gradations.
Cassirer is quite right in saying: "Beethoven's intuition is in
the realm of music. Phidias' intuition is in that of sculpture,
Milton's in epic poetry, and Goethe's in lyric poetry. All of this
concerns not merely the external husk, but the core of their
creative work." 21 But this only means that the imagination of
an artist works within some medium. Perhaps it was a mere
coincidence that originally presented this medium to his imagi-
nation. Perhaps he has to change and develop the medium in
order to make it a vehicle for what he wants to say. Perhaps,
having had an initial experience of various media, he chooses
the one which for some reason or other suits him best a deaf
man, for instance, is not likely to choose music, nor a colour-
blind man painting. One puts a false interpretation upon these
facts, if one infers that the types of intuition enumerated by
Cassirer are categorial and a priori divisions.
One may very well, it may be added, recognize the non-
categorial and merely empirical status of the arts and at the
same time dislike the romantic confusions, rooted in a love of
suggestion for its own sake. Irving Babbitt was thoroughly
right in The New Laokoon, An Essay on the Confusion of the
Arts (1910). These romantics want to put us in a state of
sensuous, even voluptuous dreaming, they want to thrill us
with strange and surprising effects. There is no contradiction
between clear insight in the non-aesthetic character of such
endeavours and recognition of the merely empirical status of
the arts and genres.
"ibid., 131.
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 351
A similar tendency to apriorize merely empirical distinctions
can be noticed in Cassirer's philosophy of language. When he
speaks of "the form of a language," it is clear that the word
"form" does not merely denote the nature of essence of lan-
guage in general but also the fundamental and enduring lin-
guistic habits of a particular people. Cassirer here uses the
word "form" in the same way as Humboldt did when speaking
of the innere Sprachform of a particular language. There is no
objection to such a terminology, unless it leads to confusion
between enduring linguistic habits (or even among these only
the habits denominated grammatical) and linguistic form per
se. For such a confusion would mean that "empirically" distin-
guished, historically conditioned habit-systems are apriorized
into eternal subdivisions of speech as a universal form of ac-
tivity.
Suppose we distinguish carefully between linguistic and ar-
tistic "form," on the one hand, and habits and traditions on the
other. Suppose further that we call the "merely empirical"
distinctions made among the latter: Stilbegriffe. Then we would
have adopted a term introduced by Cassirer in Zur Logik der
Kulturwissenschajten y using it in approximately the same sense
as he does. In order to write the history of language and of art
thus Cassirer begins his exposition of what he means by
Stilbegriffe we need a great variety of terms describing the
structure of artistic and linguistic phenomena. Open any gram-
mar or any history of art or literature, and you will be able
to grab them with both hands. Thus Wolfflin distinguishes be-
tween a "picturesque" and a "linear" style, and Humboldt in-
troduces the notion of "polysynthetic" languages. These types
of concepts, Cassirer goes on to say, differ both from those of
natural science and from the concepts of value (Wertbegriffe).
So far no objection can be raised. Certainly history and the
enquiry into general terms must keep pacej a theory of language
and a theory of art are indispensable in writing the history
of these activities. 22 But are the basic concepts in these theories
M "On the one hand it is clear that the creation of a theory of language is not
possible without constant reference to the results achieved in the history of language
and in psychology of language. Such a theory can not be erected in the empty space
of [mere] abstraction or speculation. But it is equally clear that empirical research
in the realm of linguistics as in that of the psychology of language must constantly
352 FOLKE LEANDER
the concepts of "language" and "art" also Stilbegriffe? Cas-
sirer says nothing about "art" in this context; but "language"
evidently is included among the "concepts of style." 23 He says
nothing about the relation of "concepts of style" to "concepts
of value" and seems to have altogether forgotten that the latter
have also a function in the theories of art and language. "Art"
is obviously a value term, since a work of art is the better, the
more it is art; on the other hand, no "picturesque" or "linear"
work of art is the better, the more picturesque or linear it is.
Similarly, "polysynthetic" is no value term, but "speech" is:
only in so far as a person manages to express what he wants to
express and this is a question of degrees has he achieved
articulate speech.
Thus Wertbegriffe are seen to denote the "form" or eternal
nature of art and language, whereas Stilbegriffe denote em-
pirically demarcated tendencies and habits. But no such sharp
distinction is to be found in Cassirer's book. The student of his
thought is left with the task of working it out for himself.
Ill
An Analysis of the Logic of History and the
Logic of Philosophy
As we have seen, "Logos" in its highest, purest and most
intense form is supposed to be identical with mathematical
science. In The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms Cassirer always
means mathematical science, when speaking of Wissenschaft.
presuppose concepts which can only be taken from the linguistic 'theory of forms.'
If investigations are to be initiated to ascertain in which order the various classes
of words occur in the linguistic development of the child, or to ascertain in which
phase the child moves from the use of the 'single word sentence* to the 'paratacticaP
sentence, and from this latter to the 'hypotacticaP sentence, it must be clear that in
such procedure [of investigation] the meaning of quite definite basic categories
of the 'theory of forms,' of grammar and of syntax, are laid down as basic. Else-
where also it is shown again and again that empirical research loses itself in
'Schemfrobleme' and gets entangled in insoluble antinomies, if careful conceptual
reflection concerning what precisely language 'is* does not come to the aid of such
research and accompanies it constantly in the putting of its questions." Zur Logik
der Kulturwissenschajten, 75.
*Ibid., 75 f.
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 353
History and philosophy are silently allowed to drop out of the
picture.
Modern philosophers since Descartes have been chiefly in-
terested in the thought-processes of mathematicians and scien-
tists. They have until recently evinced little interest in those
of the historians. And very few have even today discovered
that their own philosophical activities might be as interesting
logically as those of scientists and mathematicians. The logic
of philosophical thought is a field which has not been discovered
at all by the majority of philosophers. Yet it is difficult to see
why general statements should not be made about the activity
of philosophizing.
When exalting mathematical science to the highest place in
our knowledge-getting life, Cassirer seems to have forgotten
the claims of his own subject, philosophy. He has said excellent
things on the activities of mathematicians and scientists, and
also some good things on history. On the activity of philosophiz-
ing there is little more than a chapter on "Subjective and
Objective Analysis" in The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms.
And this chapter does not take us very far.
A brief criticism of other thinkers may be helpful. Dewey
touches upon the logic of philosophy, or more specifically the
logic of logical enquiry, in the Introduction to his Logic. 2 * He
believes that the philosopher's thought-processes can be ac-
counted for by a pragmatic logic 5 they present no special diffi-
culties. Similarly, logical positivists, when occasionally con-
fronted with the problem, affirm that their own philosophy is
a hypothesis of the same sort as any other scientific hypothesis.
Their own philosophy, in other words, is only probable and
must be verified by experience. But anyone who says: "Our
philosophy is only a hypothesis," is surely talking nonsense; for
in this statement is implicitly contained another one: "The
criterion of verification is the ultimate court of appeal deciding
the fate of each and every philosophy." An absolute, unhypo-
thetical statement has been made. To put it in other words:
anyone who asserts that "'philosophies are hypotheses" thereby
affirms hypothesis-verification as the ultimate truth about our
* Logic: The Theory of Inquiry, by John Dewey (New York, 1938).
354 FOLKE LEANDER
knowledge-getting life. To put it in a third manner: when we
are supposed to be choosing between various systems of philo-
sophical axioms by testing their applicability to experience, we
are also supposed already to have a philosophical system, of
which the idea of "applicability to experience" forms a part.
This shows that the logic of philosophy does present special
difficulties and does not fit into pragmatic logic.
What, then, is the logic of philosophical thinking? If phi-
losophy is self-knowledge, the logic of philosophy is an account
of what happens in self-knowledge. That self-knowledge does
not fit into pragmatic logic can easily be shown. It is often
affirmed that all a priori truth is analytic and all empirical state-
ments merely probable. But if one can be sure of an analytic
truth, one can certainly also be sure of the existence of the
thought-process in which the analytic truth is being sought; and
one can also affirm with certainty that the existential thought-
process in question belongs to a certain kind of thought-processes,
those which the theory calls analytic. Here is an element of
self-knowledge which is at once a priori and empirical. Further,
no verification of a hypothesis can take place, unless we can
know with certainty that we are verifying a hypothesis; an
infinite regress of verifying that we are verifying provides no
escape from nihilism it is like lifting oneself by one's boot-
straps. Without an assertion somewhere there can be no proba-
bility, only a mass of hypothetical sentences; even an infinite
amount of "if-then"-sentences does not provide us with a
single probability. Self-knowledge that we are verifying is
accordingly indispensable. Similarly, the philosophical method
of analyzing linguistic statements presupposes the absolute
knowledge (at once empirical and a priori) that "this is a lin-
guistic statement" and this is a piece of self-knowledge,
knowledge of our own activity of speaking and of reconstruct-
ing other people's expressions.
In short, knowledge of our own activities and attitudes
verifying analytic thinking, expressing oneself (speaking), re-
constructing expressions (listening, reading), imagining, ob-
serving, philosophizing, etc., must in a sense be immediate
and direct, for otherwise the whole structure of knowledge
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 355
would break down. Self-knowledge is the basis of all other
knowledge. Now self-knowledge is in one respect historical
(knowledge of individual processes) and in another respect
philosophical (knowledge of the general categories of activity,
like those just mentioned). The history of philosophy is the
history of a growing insight into the nature of our own ac-
tivities. And the method of philosophy has been a sort of
direct inspection of our activities, often called "reflection"
upon them.
Now what has just been advanced as a criticism of prag-
matism and logical positivism indicates the way I believe mod-
ern philosophy will develop. 25 And it also indicates a realm
which Cassirer has left unexplored. The logical analysis of what
philosophers are doing and how they do it the logic of think-
ing the Idea, as Hegel would say has become a problem to
modern neo-Hegelians like Emil Lask, Theodor Litt, Richard
Kroner and Benedetto Croce. 26 But Cassirer remains a neo-
Kantian and refuses to venture into these problems. Abstract
mathematics and unreal scientific constructions are to him the
true nature of Logos. We go beyond him by identifying Logos
with the Idea and interpreting philosophy as the self-conscious-
ness of Logos.
The subject may also be approached from another angle, by
a detour over the subject of "freedom and form." This was
the theme of a volume of essays which Cassirer published dur-
ing the first world war: Freiheit und Form (Berlin, 1916).
The basic idea is that freely developing life finds its own law
within itself, that "form" is no restriction on freedom, unless
it be merely external, pseudo-classical, conventional, based upon
* Those interested in a fuller development of this criticism may read my article,
"Analyse des Wirklichkeitsbegriffs," in Theoria, vol. IX, (1943).
*E. Lask: Die Logik der Philosofhie und die Kategorienlefare, Ges. Schr. II,
Tubingen, 1923.
Th.Litt: Einleitung in die Philosophic, 1933, p. 1-33$ Kant und Herder , 1930,
ch. 3 j Das Allgemeine im Aufbau der geisteswissenschaftlichen Erkenntnis, Leipzig*
1941 (a brief summary).
R. Kroner: Von Kant bis Hegel, MI, Tubingen, 1921-1924, esp. vol. I, pp.
103$, 2895. Croce anticipated the Germans by several years. See his Logica come
scienza del concetto furo, Bar. 1908.
356 FOLKE LEANDER
outer pressure. In the volume mentioned Cassirer applied this
idea to the fields of aesthetics, ethics, and politics.
As Cassirer himself points out, the problem of The Philoso-
phy of Symbolic Forms is also at bottom a question of freedom
and form. It might seem as if myth and language cut us off from
reality, covering it with a many-coloured veil of "subjective" il-
lusions. The free expansion of individuality might seem detri-
mental to our knowledge of reality. But Cassirer shows that this
is not really the case. Pre-scientific symbolism is really a method
of exploring reality, having its own type of objectivity, its own
"form," in which the expansion of individuality issues.
What, according to Cassirer, is the "objectivity" or truth
of myth? His answer is that the truth of myth is what myth does
in the intuitive elaboration of experience. This view may be
elucidated by a quotation from an American writer on art:
Science may seem dry and trivial or mechanical to those who have no
desire to understand the world intellectually; and poetry seem tedious,
futile, or trifling to those who care nothing for imaginative under-
standing. Each is right in his own sphere, and wrong only in supposing
that his sphere leaves room for no other. 27
The artist, he adds, is primarily the discoverer, just as the
scientist is; the scientist invents abstract laws which may be
used for the purposes of calculation and prediction; the artist
explores reality in a different way. We see only by utilizing the
vision of others, and this vision is embodied in the traditions
of art. Pre-scientific symbolism, according to Cassirer, serves
the purpose of imaginative, intuitive understanding. The pas-
sage just quoted corresponds to Cassirer's thought (and to the
general trend of contemporary philosophy) also in another
respect: in its tendency to leave out history and philosophy
altogether. Failure to analyze the last-mentioned activities is
indeed the weakness of contemporary thought. When this
analysis has been performed, it will be clear, I believe, that
individuality plays no less a role in history and philosophy
than in art, myth, and language, and that here too the expansion
of individuality is compatible with "form" and objectivity.
* A. Barnes: The Art in Painting, 37.
FURTHER PROBLEMS OF SYMBOLIC FORMS 357
Only science is in substance impersonal. Of course, it takes indi-
viduals to create it, but individuality is no part of the results,
which are strictly impersonal. "Freedom and form" as the
Leitmotiv of Cassirer's philosophy cannot come into its own
as long as mathematical science is taken to be the apex of our
knowing life. As a system of practical procedures science is our
way of controlling the forces of nature. Yet, if nature be some-
thing of the kind pictured by Alfred N. Whitehead, practical
control is surely something very different from real understand-
ing in the sense of Verstehen. Maybe natural history can only
be dead history to us, a mere chronicle; at all events real under-
standing, where it is possible, i. e., in the human world, touches
the rock-bottom of reality in a way that cannot be rivalled by
the merely external approach of science. The apex of knowledge
cannot therefore be sought in the latter; it is the self-knowledge
of the mind.
If there is any truth in what has just been said, the problem
of "freedom and form" is the fundamental problem of logic
and epistemology. The compatibility of individuality of vision
with objective truth must be established not only on the level
of artistic, mythical, and linguistic symbolism but also on the
level of historical and philosophical knowledge. Every philoso-
pher has his own truths to reveal, and these truths are not
mutually incompatible; only by being intensely himself, by
working out his own deepest inspiration, will he bring a unique
contribution to the progress of thought. Even if Cassirer has
not worked out the theory of freedom and form in philosophi-
cal progress, he has, by his whole work, given us a brilliant
illustration of it.
FOLKE LEANDER
HOGS KOLA
GOTEBORC, SWEDEN
10
M. F. Ashley Montagu
CASSIRER ON MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING
IO
CASSIRER ON MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING
IN SUBSTANZBEGRIFF UND FUNKTIONSBE-
GRIFF (1910) we learn that the study arose out of
the attempt to comprehend the fundamental conceptions of
mathematics from the point of view of logic. Cassirer found
that it became necessary to analyze and trace back the funda-
mental presuppositions of the nature of a concept itself. This led
to a renewed analysis of the principles of concepts in general.
In the course of his analysis of the special sciences it became
evident that the systematic structure of the exact sciences
assumes different forms according to the different logical per-
spectives in which they are regarded. Hence the necessity of
the analysis of the forms of conceptual construction and of the
general function of concepts 5 for it is obvious that the con-
ception which is formed of the fundamental nature of the
concept is directly significant in judging the questions of fact in
any criticism of knowledge or metaphysics.
From such considerations with respect to the processes of
knowing, and the conceptual formalization of that knowing
as related to the pure sciences, Cassirer was led to a consideration
of the more fundamental problem of the primitive origins of
these processes and their development. The first fruits of his
studies in this field he published in 1923, as the first instalment
of a large work entitled Philosofhie der symboUschen Formen
(Bruno Cassirer Verlag, Berlin) j this first volume was devoted
to "Die Syrache" in which the nature and function of language
was considered. A second volume devoted to "Das mythische
Denizen" which is discussed in the present chapter was pub-
lished in 19255 and the third and last volume, entitled "Pha-
nomenologie der Erkenntnis" made its appearance in 1929.
362 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
Of these volumes I think it is no exaggeration to say that they
constitute perhaps the most important and certainly the most
brilliant work in this field which has yet been published.
Before entering upon a presentation of Cassirer's treatment
of the nature of mythological thinking it is necessary to present
something of his views with respect to the nature of language as
propaedeutic to the former.
Cassirer insists on the fact that in consciousness, whether
theoretical, artistic, or linguistic, we see a kind of mirror, the
image falling upon which reflects not only the nature of the
object existing externally but also the nature of consciousness it-
self. All forms brought into being by the mind are due to a
creative force, to a spontaneous act in the Kantian sense, thanks
to which that which is realized is something quite other than a
simple reception or registration of facts exterior or foreign to
the mind. We are now dealing not only with an entering into
the possession of facts, but with the lending to them of a
certain character, with an integration of them in a determinate
physical order. Thus, the act of consciousness which gives birth
to one or the other of these forms, to science, to art, and to
language, does not simply discover and reproduce an ensemble
of pre-existent objects. This act, the processes which give birth to
it, lead rather to this objective universe, and contribute towards
constituting its being and structure. The essential function of
language is not arbitrarily to assign designations to objects al-
ready formed and achieved j language is rather a means indis-
pensable to that formation, even of objects. Similarly, in the
plastic arts, the creative act consists in the construction of space,
in conquering it, in opening a path of access to it, which each
of these arts makes according to the manner that is specific
to it. Similarly, in respect of language it is necessary to return
to the theory of Wilhelm von Humboldt according to which
the diversity of languages expresses the diversity of aspects from
which the world is seen and conceived by the different linguistic
groups, and which consequently contribute to the formation of
the different representations of the world. But one cannot ob-
serve the intimate operations of the mind which are at work in
the formation of language. Psychology, even after having
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 363
abandoned the concepts of apperception and of association con-
cepts which during the nineteenth century stood in the way of
the realization of Humboldt's ideas -does not provide a
method which permits direct access to the specific process of
the mind which ends by leading to the production of the ver-
bal. What experimentation and introspection renders percepti-
ble are the facts impregnated by language and by them, not the
manner of formation, but the achieved state.
If one wishes to go back to the origin of language and, in-
stead of being content with the linguistic facts and findings, one
seeks to discover the creative principle, one can be satisfied only
with those regions in which the formation of the language is
known, in all its particulars, and to attempt by an analysis of
the structure of the languages of these regions, by a regressive
method, to arrive at the genetic factors of language.
Cassirer's study deals with the languages of a number of
regions of this kind, inquiring into their mode of arriving at
an objective representation of the world. According to Cassirer
the lower animals are incapable of such objective representa-
tions; they find themselves enclosed in an environment, in
which they live, move, and have their being, but which they are
unable to oppose, and which they are incapable of viewing
objectively, since they cannot transcend it, consider or conceive
it. The impressions they receive do not pass beyond the level of
urges to action, and between these they fail to develop those
specific relations which result in a true notion of that objectivity
which is essentially defined by the constancy and identity of the
object. This transition from a world of action and effectiveness
to the world of objective representation only begins to manifest
itself, in mankind, at a stage which coincides with a certain
phase in the development of language; viz., at that stage which
the child exhibits when it grows to understand that a whole
thing corresponds to a particular value or denomination, and
at which it is constantly demanding of those about it the names
of things. But it does not occur to the child to attach these
designations to the representation of things already stabilized
and consolidated. The child's questions bear rather more on the
things themselves. For in the eyes of the child, as in the eyes
364 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
of primitive peoples, the name is not an extrinsic denomination
of the thing which one arbitrarily attaches to it, but it is rather
an essential quality of the object of which it forms an integral
part. The principal value of this denominative phase is that it
tends to stabilize and to consolidate the objective representation
of things and permits the child to conquer the objective world
in which it is henceforth to live. For this task he needs some
name. If, for a multiplicity of impressions one sets apart the
same name, these different impressions will no longer remain
strange to one another 5 in this way they will come to represent
simply aspects of the modes of appearance of the same thing.
The loss of this conceptual and symbolic function of the word
leads to such effects as one may observe in those suffering from
aphasia. That which language renders possible on the plane of
objects, viz., a separation or distinction between subjects and
thingSy it permits equally in the domain of sentiment and voli-
tion. In this domain also language is more than a simple means
of expression and of communication} this it is only at the begin-
ning of human life, when the infant gives expression without
any reserve to the states of pleasure and of pain which it experi-
ences y and it is language which provides the infant with a
means of getting into contact with the outside world. Language
prolongs these affective states, but it does not in any way alter
them. Things, however, present another aspect as soon as the
child acquires representational language. Henceforth, his vocal
expressions will no longer be simple exclamations, nor of pure
expansiveness apart from these emotional states. That which the
child expresses is now informed by the fact that his expressions
have taken the form of intelligible words, the child hears and
understands what he himself says. He thus becomes capable of
knowing his own states in a representative and objective man-
ner, of apperceiving and looking at them as he does at external
things. He thus becomes capable of reflecting upon his own
affective life, and of adopting in relation to that life an attitude
of contemplation. In this way his affective energies gradually
lose that power of brutal constraint which it exercises, during
early infancy, upon the "self." The fact that emotion attains
to a consciousness of itself, renders man to some extent free of
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 365
it. To the pure emotion are henceforth opposed those intellec-
tual forces which support representational language. Emotion
will now be held in constraint by these forces, it will no longer
obtain an immediate and direct expression, but will have to
justify itself before language, which now assumes the position
of an instrument of the mind. In this connection we may recall
the Greek idea that man must not abandon his passions, that
these rather must be submitted to the judgment of the Logos,
to that reason which is incorporated in language.
Thanks to its regulative powers, language transforms senti-
ments .and volitions, and organizes them into a conscious will,
and thus contributes to the constitution of the moral self. There
is still another domain into which one can gain entry only
through the medium of language, it is the social world. Up to a
certain point in the moral evolution of humanity, all moral and
intellectual community is bound to the linguistic community,
in much the same way as men speaking a foreign language are
excluded from the protection and advantages which are alone
enjoyed by members of the community considered as equals.
And in the development of the individual, language constitutes
for the child, who is beginning to learn, a more important and
a more direct experience than that of the social and normative
bond. But when for his characteristic infantile state he com-
mences to substitute representational language, and experiences
the need of being understood by his environment, he discovers
the necessity of adapting his own efforts without reservation to
the customs characteristic of the community to which he belongs.
Without losing anything of his own individuality, he must
adapt himself to those among whom he is destined to live. It
is thus through the medium of a particular language that the
child becomes aware of the bond which ties it to a particular
community. This social bond becomes closer and more spiritual-
ized during the course of its development. When the child
commences to pose the questions What is it? and Why? not
only is he going to penetrate into the world of knowledge, but
also into a conquest of that world and a collective possession
of it. Not only does the tendency to possess a thing begin to
give way before the desire to acquire knowledge, but what is
366 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
still more important, the relations which hold him to his en-
vironment are going to be reorganized. The desire for physical
assistance begins to transform itself into a desire for intellectual
assistance} the contact of the child with the members of its
environment is going to become a spiritual contact. Little by
little, the constraint, the commands and prohibitions, the
obediences and resistances, which up to now have characterized
the relations between the child and the adult gives way to that
reciprocity which exists between the one who asks and waits for
a reply, and the one who takes an interest in the question
asked and replies. Thus arise the bases of spiritual liberty and
of that free collaboration which is the characteristic mark of
society in so far as it is human.
Finally, Cassirer assigns a capital importance to language
in the construction of the world of pure imagination, above all
to that state of conscious development wherein the decisive
distinction between the real and the imagined is not made. The
question that has so much occupied psychologists, whether the
play of the child represents for it a veritable reality or merely
a conscious occupation with fictions, this question, asserts Cas-
sirer, is malposed, since the play of the child, like the Myth,
belongs to a phase of consciousness which does not yet under-
stand the distinction between that which is real and that which
merely is simply imagined. In the eyes of the child the world
is not composed of pure objects, of real forms, it is, on the
contrary, peopled by beings who are his equals; and the charac-
ter of the living and the animate is not limited for him, to that
which is specifically human. The world, for him, has the form
of Thou and not of That. This anthropomorphism of the child
arises out of the fact that the child speaks to the things which
surround him, and the things speak to him. It is no accident
that there is no substitute for dumb playj when playing the
child does not cease to speak of and to the things with which
he is playing. It is not that this activity is an accessory com-
mentary of play, but rather it is an indispensable element of it.
The child views every object, all beings, as an interlocutor of
whom he asks questions and who reply to him. His relation to
the world is above all else a verbal relation, and Cassirer asserts
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 367
that the child does not speak to things because he regards them
as animate y but on the contrary y he regards them as animate be-
cause he speaks with them. It is much later that the distinction is
made between that which is pure thing and that which is ani-
mate and living. The most developed of languages still retain
traces of this original state. The lack of such distinctions is
strikingly evident when we study the languages, the mental
instruments, of the simpler peoples, a study which is obviously
necessary for any true understanding of mythological thinking.
Cassirer's approach to mythology is that of the neo-Kantian
phenomenologist; he is not interested in mythology as such,
but in the processes of consciousness which lead to the creation
of myths. It will be recalled that he was originally concerned
with inquiring into the bases of empirical knowledge, but since
a knowledge of a world of empirical things or properties was
preceded by a world characterized by mythical powers and
forces, and since early philosophy drew its spiritual powers
from and created its perspective upon the bases of these mythical
factors, a consideration of them is clearly of importance. The
relation between myth and philosophy is a close one; for if the
myth is taken to be an indirect expression of reality, it can be
understood only as an attempt to point the way, it is a prepara-
tion for philosophy. The form and content of myth impede the
realization of a rational content of knowledge, which reflection
alone reveals, and of which it discovers the kernel. An illustra-
tion of this effect of myth upon knowledge may be seen in the
attempts of the sophists of the Fifth Century to work from
myth to empirical knowledge, in their newly founded scientific
wisdom. Myth was by them understood and explained, and
translated into the language of popular philosophy, as an all
embracing speculative science of nature or of ethical truth.
It is no accident, remarks Cassirer, that just that Greek
thinker in whom the characteristic power of creating the mythi-
cal was so outstanding should reject the whole world of mythi-
cal images, namely, Plato. For it was Plato who was opposed to
the attempts at myth-analysis in the manner of the Sophists
and rhetoricians; for him these attempts represented a play
of wit in a difficult, though not very refined, subject (Phaedrus*
368 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
229). Plato failed to see the significance of the mythical world,
seeing it only as something opposed to pure knowledge. The
myth must be separated from science, and appearance be dis-
tinguished from reality. The myth however transcends all ma-
terial meaning} and here it occupies a definite place and plays
a necessary part for our understanding of the world, and accord-
ing to the philosophy of the Platonic school it can work as a true
creative and formative motive. The profounder view which
has conquered here has, in the continuity of Greek thought, not
always been carried through nor had quite the same meaning.
The Stoics as well as the neo-Platonists returned to the Platonic
view as did the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
In the newer philosophy the myth becomes the problem of
philosophy when it is recognized that there exists a primordial
directive of the spirit, an intrinsic way of forming knowledge.
The spirit (Geist) forges the conditions necessary to itself. In
this connection Giambattista Vico may be regarded as the
founder of the new philosophy of language and of mythology.
The real and true knowledge of the unitary idea of the spirit is
shown in the triad of Language, Art, and Myth.
The critical problem of the origin of the aesthetic and ethical
judgment, which Kant inquired into, was transferred by Schel-
ling to the field of myth. For Kant the problem does not ask for
psychological origins or beginnings but for pure existence and
content. Myth does not make its appearance, like morality or
art, as a self-contained world in itself, which may be measured
by objective values and reality measurements, but it must be
understood through its own immanent laws of structure and of
being. Every attempt to make this world understandable by
simple direct means only reveals the reflection of something
else.
In the empirical comparisons of myths a distinct trend was
noticeable to measure not only the range of mythical thinking
but also to describe the unitary forms of consciousness and its
characteristics. Just as in physics the concept of the unit of the
physical world led to a deepening of its principles, so in folklore
the problem of a general mythology instead of special research
gained for it a new lease on life. Out of the conflicting schools
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 369
there appeared no other way than to think in terms of a
single source of myth and of a distinct form of orientation.
From this way of treating myth arose the conception of a funda-
mental mythical view of the world. Fundamental and character-
istic motives were found for the whole world, even where space
and time relations could not be demonstrated. As soon as the
attempt was made to separate these motives, to distinguish be-
tween them, and to discover which were the truly primitive
ones, conflicting views were again brought to the fore more
sharply than ever. It was the task of folklore in association with
folk psychology to determine the order of the appearances and
to uncover the general laws and principles with respect to the
formation of myths. But the unity of these principles disap-
peared even before one had assured oneself of the existence of
the necessary fullness and variety of myths.
Besides the mythology of nature, there is the mythology
of the soul. In the first there are involved a large variety of
myths which have a definite object of nature for their kernel.
One always asked of each single myth whether it bore a distinct
relation to some natural thing or event. One had to approach
the matter in this way because only in this way could phantasy
be distinguished, and a strictly objective position arrived at.
But the arbitrary power of building hypotheses, seen in a strictly
objective way, showed that it was nearly as great as the creation
of phantasy. The older form of the storm and thunder my-
thology was the opposite of the astral mythology which itelf,
again, took different forms, sun mythology, lunar mythology,
and stellar mythology.
Another approach to the ultimate unity of myth creation
attempted to see it not as a natural but more as a spiritual unity,
expressing this unity not in the field of the object but as in the
historical field of culture. Were it possible to find such a field
of culture for the general origin of the great fundamental
mythical motives and themes, as a center from which they
eventually spread over the whole world, it would be a simple
matter to explain the inner relation and systematic consequences
of these themes and motives. If any such relation in a known
form is obscure, it must appear at once, if one but refers to the
370 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
best historical source for it. When the older theorists, e.g.,
Benfey, looked to India for the most important motives, there
seemed to be certain striking evidences for the historical unity
and association of myth forming; this became even more so
when Babylonian culture became better known. With the find-
ing of this homeland of culture the answer was also found to the
question as to the home of myth and its unitary structure.
The answer to Pan-Babylonianism is that myth could never
have developed a consistent world viewpoint if it had been
constituted out of a primitive magic, idea, dream, emotion or
superstition. The path to such a Weltanschauung was much
more likely to be there where there was in existence a distinct
proof of a conception of the world as an ordered whole a con-
dition which was fulfilled in the beginning of Babylonian
astronomy and cosmogony. From this spiritual and historical
viewpoint the possibility is opened up that myth is not only a
form of pure phantasy but is in itself a finished and compre-
hensive system. What, remarks Cassirer, is so interesting about
this theory in the methodological sense is that not only does
it attempt the empirical proof of the real historical origin of
myth, but it also attempts to give a sort of a priori substantia-
tion to the proper direction and goal of mythological research.
That all myths have an astral origin and should in the end
prove to be calendric, is stated by the students of the Pan-
Babylonian school to be the basic principle of the method. It is
a sort of Ariadne's thread, which is alone able to lead through
the labyrinth of mythology. By this means it was not very
difficult to fill in the various lacunae which the empiric tradi-
tion had somehow failed to make good, but this very means
showed ever more clearly that the fundamental problem of the
unit of the mythological consciousness could not really be
explained in the manner of the historical objective empirical
school.
It becomes more and more certain that the simple statement
of unity of the fundamental mythical ideas cannot really give
any insight into the structure of the forms of mythical phantasy
and of mythical thinking. To define the structure of this form,
when one does not desert the basis of pure descriptive con-
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 371
siderations, requires no more elaborate conception than Bastian's
concept of "Volkergedanken" Bastian maintained that the varie-
ties of the objective approach do not simply consider the con-
tent and objects of mythology, but start off from the question
as to the function of myth. The fundamental principle of this
function should remain to be proved; in this way various
resemblances are discovered and relations demonstrated. From
the beginning the sought-for unity is both from the inside
and the outside transferred from the phenomena of reality to
those of the spirit. But this idealism, as long as it is received
psychologically and determined through the categories of psy-
chology, is not characterized by a single meaning. When we
speak of mythology as the collective expression of mankind,
this unity must finally be explained out of the unity of the
human soul and out of the homogeneity of its behaviour. But
the unity of the soul expresses itself in a great variety of
potencies and forms. As soon as the question is asked which
of these potencies play the respective roles in the building up
of the mythical world, there immediately arise conflicting and
contradictory controversial explanations. Is the myth ulti-
mately derived from the play of subjective phantasy, or does
it in some cases rest upon a real view of things, upon which
it is based? Is it a primitive form of knowledge (Erkenntnls}
and in this connection is it a form of intellection, or does it be-
long rather to the sphere of affection and conation? To this
question scientific myth-analysis has returned different an-
swers. Just as formerly the theories differed with respect to
the objects which were considered necessary to the creation
of myths, in the same way they now differed in respect of the
fundamental psychic processes to which these are considered to
lead back. The conception of a pure intellectual mythology
made its reappearance, the idea that the essence of the myth
was to be sought in the intellectual analysis of experience.
In opposition to Schelling's demand for a tautegorical (ex-
pressing the same thing in different words, opposed to allegori-
cal) analysis of myth an allegorical explanation was sought for
(See Fritz Langer, Intellektualmythologle^ Leipzig, 1916).
In all this is evident the danger to which the myth is ex-
372 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
posed, the danger of becoming lost in the depths of a particular
theory. In all these theories the sought-for unity is transferred
in error to the particular elements instead of being looked for
in that spiritual whole, the symbolic world of meaning, out
of which these elements are created. We must, on the other
hand, says Cassirer, look for the fundamental laws of the
spirit to which the myth goes back. Just as in the process of
arriving at knowledge The Rhapsody of Perceptions (Rha-p-
sodie der W ahrnehmwngeri) is, by means of certain laws and
forms of thinking, transmuted into knowledge, so we can and
must ask for the creation of that form unity, the unending and
manifold world of the myth, which is not a conglomerate of
arbitrary ideas and meaningless notions, a characteristic spiritual
genitor. We must look at the myth from a genetic-causal, teleo-
logical standpoint j in this way we shall find that what is pre-
sented to us is something which as a complete form possesses a
self-sufficient being and an autochthonous sense.
The myth represents in itself the first attempts at a knowl-
edge of the world, and since it furthermore possibly represents
the earliest form of aesthetic phantasy, we see in it that particu-
lar unity of the spirit of which all separate forms are but a
single manifestation. We see too, here, that instead of an
original unity in which the opposites lose themselves, and seem
to combine with one another, that the critical-transcendental
idea-unit seeks the clear definition and delimitation of the
separate forms in order to preserve them. The principle of this
separation becomes clear when one compares here the problem
of meaning with that of characterization that is, when one
reflects upon the way in which the various spiritual forms of
expression, such as "Object 71 with "Idea or Image," and "Con-
tent" with "Sign," are related to one another.
In this we see the fundamental element of the parallelism,
namely, the creative power of the "sign" in myth as in lan-
guage, and in art, as well as in the process of forming a
theoretical idea in a word, and in relation to the world. What
Humboldt said of language, that man places it between him-
self and. the internal and external world that is acting upon
him, that he surrounds himself with a world of sounds with
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 373
which to take up and to work up the world of objects, holds
true also for the myth and for the aesthetic fancy. They are
not so much reactions to impressions, which are exercised from
the outside upon the spirit, but they are much more real
spiritual activities. At the outset, in the definite sense of the
primitive expression of the myth it is clear that we do not
have to deal with a mere reflection or mirage of Reality (Seiri),
but with a characteristic treatment and presentation of it. Also
here one can observe how in the beginning the tension between
"Subject" and "Object," "Internal" and "External," grad-
ually diminishes, a richer and multiform new middle state
stepping in between both worlds. To the material world which
it embraces and governs the spirit opposes its own independent
world of images the power of Impression gradually becomes
more distinct and more conscious than the active power of Ex-
pression. But this creation does not yet in itself possess the
character of an act of free will, but still bears the character
of a natural necessity, the character of a certain psychic "mecha-
nism." Since at this level there does not yet exist an inde-
pendent and self-conscious free living "I," but because we here
stand upon the threshold of the spiritual processes which are
bound to react against each other, the "I" and the "World,"
the new world of the "Sign" must appear to the conciousness
as a thoroughly objective reality. Every beginning of the
myth, especially every magical conception of the world, is
permeated by this belief in the existence of the objective power
of the sign. Word magic, picture-magic, and script-magic pro-
vide the fundaments of magical practices and the magical view
of the world. When one examines the complete structure of the
mythical consciousness one can detect in this a characteristic
paradox. For if the generally prevailing conception, that the
fundamental urge of the myth is to vivify, is true, that is that it
tends to take a concrete view in the statement and representa-
tion of all the elements of existence, how does it happen, then,
that these urges point most intensely to the most unreal and
non- vital; how is it that the shadow-empire of words, of
images, and signs gains such a substantial ascendancy and power
over the mythical consciousness? How is it that it possesses this
374 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
belief in the abstract, in this cult of symbols in a world in which
the general idea is nothing, the sensation (Empfindung), the
direct urge, the (sensible) psychic perception and outlook seem
to be everything? The answer to this question, says Cassirer,
can be found only when one is aware of the fact that it is
improperly stated. The mythical world is not so concrete that it
deals only with psychically 'objective' contents, or simply
'abstract' considerations, but both the thing and its meaning
form one distinct and direct concrete unity, they are not differ-
entiated from one another. The myth raises itself spiritually
above the world of things, but it exchanges for the forms and
images which it puts in their place only another form of restric-
tive existence. What the spirit appears to rescue from the
shackles now becomes but a new shackle, which is so much
more unyielding because it is not only a psychical power but a
spiritual one. Nevertheless, such a state already contains in it-
self the immanent condition of its future release. It already
contains the incipient possibility of a spiritual liberation which
in the progress of the magical-mythical world-idea will even-
tually arrive at a characteristic religious world-idea. During this
transition it becomes necessary for the spirit to place itself in
a new and free relation to the world of images and signs, but,
at the same time, in a different way than formerly, sees through
this relationship, and in this way raises itself above it, though
living it still and needing it.
And in still further measure and in greater distinctness
stands for us the dialectic of these fundamental relations, their
analysis and synthesis, which the spirit through its own self-
made world of images experiences, when we here compare the
myth with all other forms of symbolic expression. In the case
of language also there is at first no sharp line of separation by
means of which the word and its meaning, the thing content
of "idea" and the simple content are distinguished from one
another. The nominalist viewpoint, for which words are con-
ventional signs, simply flatus vocis, is the result of later reflec-
tion but not the direct expression of the direct natural language
consciousness. For this the existence of things in words is not
only indicated as indirect, but is contained and present in it any-
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 375
way. In the language consciousness of the primitive and in that
of the child one can demonstrate this concrescence of names and
things in very pregnant examples one has only to think of
the different varieties of the taboo names. But in the progression
of the spiritual development of language there is also here
achieved a sharper and ever more conscious separation between
the Word and Being or Existence, between the Meaning and
the Meant. Opposed to all other physical being and all physical
activity the word appears as autonomous and characteristic, in
its purely ideal and significative function.
A new stage of the separation is next witnessed in art. Here,
too, there is in the beginning no clear distinction between the
"Ideal" and the "Real." The beginning of the formation and
of the cultivation of art reaches back to a sphere in which the
act of cultivation itself is strongly rooted in the magical idea,
and is directed to a definite magical end, of which the picture
(Bild) is yet in no way independent, and has no pure aesthetic
meaning. Nevertheless already in the first impulse of char-
acteristic artistic configurations, in the stages of spiritual forms of
expression, quite a new principle is attained. The view of the
world which the spirit opposes to the simple world of matter
and of things subsequently attains here to a pure immanent
value and truth. It does not attach itself or refer to another;
but it simply /V, and consists in itself. Out of the sphere of
activity (Wirksamkeit), in which the mythical consciousness,
and out of the sphere of meaning, in which the marks of lan-
guage remain, we are now transferred to a sphere, in which so to
say, only the pure essence (Sein), only its own innermost nature
(Wesenheii) of the image (Bildes) is seized as such. Thus, the
world of images forms in itself a Kosmos which is complete in
itself, and which rests within its own centre of gravity. And to
it the spirit is now first able to find a free relation. The aesthetic
world is measured according to the measure of things, the
realistic outlook according to a world of appearance: but since
in just this appearance the relation to direct reality, to the
world of being and action (Wirken), in which also the magical-
mythical outlook has its being, is now left behind, there is thus
made a completely new step towards truth. Thus there present
376 M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
themselves in relation to Myth, Language, and to Art, con-
figurations which are linked directly together in a certain histori-
cal series, by means of a certain systematic progression (Stujen-
gang), and ideal progress (Fortschritt), as the object of which
it can be said the spirit in its own creations, in its self-made
symbols, not only exists and lives, but gains its significance.
There is a certain pertinence, in this connection, in that dominant
theme of HegePs Phenomenology of the Spirit, namely, that
the object of development lies in the comprehension and ex-
pression of the fact that the spiritual being is not only "Sub-
stance" but just as much "Subject." In this respect the problems
which grow out of a "Philosophy of Mythology" resolve
themselves once more to such as arise from the philosophy of
pure logic. Then also science separates itself from the other
stages of spiritual life, not because it stands in need of any
kind of mediation or intervention through signs and symbols,
seeking naked truth, the truth of "things-in-themselves," but
because it uses the symbols differently and more profoundly
than the former is able to do, and recognizes and understands
them as such, i.e., as symbols. Furthermore, this is not accom-
plished at one stroke 5 rather there is here also repeated, at
a new stage, the typical fundamental relation of the spirit to
its own creation. Here also must the freedom of this creation
be gained and secured in continuous critical work. The utiliza-
tion of hypotheses, and its characteristic function to advance the
foundations of knowledge, determines that, so long as this
knowledge is not secured, the principles of science are unable
to express themselves in other than dinglicher, i.e., material,
or in half mythical form.
Every student of primitive peoples and of mythology would
recognize in Cassirer's views on mythological thinking, which
have here been presented only partially, a valuable contribution
towards the clarification of a difficult problem. In a brilliant
chapter in which Cassirer discusses "the dialectic of the mythical
consciousness," he shows how interrelated and interdependent
the mythical and religious consciousness are, and that there can
really be no distinction between themj there is a difference in
form, but not in substance. An admirable discussion of the rela-
MYTHOLOGICAL THINKING 377
tion of "speech" to "language" and of "sound" to "meaning"
(already dealt with at length in the first volume of the Sym-
bolischen Formen) leads to a brief discussion of writing.
Cassirer points out that all writing begins as picture-signs
which do not in themselves embrace any meaning or communi-
cative characters. The picture-sign takes the place rather of the
object itself, replaces it, and stands for it.
This statement is perfectly true of all forms of primitive
writing. One of the most primitive forms of writing, for ex-
ample, with which we are acquainted is that invented and
practiced by certain Australian tribes. On the message sticks
which they send from one tribe to another the signs which they
make fulfill all the specifications stated by Cassirer.
Cassirer also states that at first writing forms a part of the
sphere of magic. The sign which is stamped on the object draws
it into the circle of its own effect and keeps away strange in-
fluences.
The anthropological data lend full support to this idea. It
may even be that the magicians were the first to invent writing,
though it would at present be impossible to prove such a sug-
gestion or even to prove that the magicians were among the
first to use picture signs. The evidence does, however, suggest
that this is highly probable.
I can only have succeeded in giving a faint indication of the
value and quality of Cassirer's contribution to our understanding
of mythological thinking in general and that of pre-literate
peoples in particular. To appreciate Cassirer's great work at
its full value the reader is recommended to go to the original
work. This essay must be regarded as but a footnote to it.
M. F. ASHLEY MONTAGU
PHILADELPHIA, PENNA.
II
Susanne K. Langer
ON CASSIRER'S THEORY OF LANGUAGE
AND MYTH
II
ON CASSIRER'S THEORY OF LANGUAGE
AND MYTH
EVERY philosopher has his tradition. His thought has de-
veloped amid certain problems, certain basic alternatives of
opinion, that embody the key concepts which dominate his time
and his environment and which will always be reflected, posi-
tively or by negation, in his own work. They are the forms of
thought he has inherited, wherein he naturally thinks, or from
which his maturer conceptions depart.
The continuity of culture lies in this handing down of usable
forms. Any campaign to discard tradition for the sake of novelty
as such, without specific reason in each case to break through a
certain convention of thought, leads to dilettantism, whether it
be in philosophy, in art, or in social and moral institutions. As
every person has his mother tongue in terms of which he can-
not help thinking his earliest thoughts, so every scholar has a
philosophical mother tongue, which colors his natural Weltan-
schauung. He may have been nurtured in a particular school
of thought, or his heritage may be the less conscious one of
"common sense," the popular metaphysic of his generation 5 but
he speaks some intellectual language that has been bestowed
on him, with its whole cargo of preconceptions, distinctions,
and evaluations, by his official and unofficial teachers.
A great philosopher, however, has something new and vital
to present in whatever philosophical mold he may have been
given. The tenor of his thought stems from the pastj but his
specific problems take shape in the face of a living present, and
his dealing with them reflects the entire, ever-nascent activity
of his own day. In all the great periods of philosophy, the lead-
ing minds of the time have carried their traditional learning
382 SUSANNE K. LANGER
lightly, and felt most deeply the challenge of things which were
new in their age. It is the new that calls urgently for interpre-
tation} and a true philosopher is a person to whom something in
the weary old world always appears new and uncomprehended.
There are certain "dead periods" in the history of philosophy,
when the whole subject seems to shrink into a hard, small shell,
treasured only by scholars in large universities. The common
man knows little about it and cares less. What marks such a
purely academic phase of philosophical thought is that its sub-
stance as well as its form is furnished by a scholastic tradition;
not only the categories, but the problems of debate are familiar.
Precisely in the most eventful epochs, when intellectual activity
in other fields is brilliant and exciting, there is quite apt to be
a lapse in philosophy; the greatest minds are engaged else-
where; reflection and interpretation are in abeyance when the
tempo of life is at its highest. New ideas are too kaleidoscopic
to be systematically construed or to suggest general proposi-
tions. Professional philosophers, therefore, continue to argue
matters which their predecessors have brought to no conclusion,
and to argue them from the same standpoints that yielded no
insight before.
We have only recently passed through an "academic" phase
of philosophy, a phase of stale problems and deadlocked "isms."
But today we are on the threshold of a new creative period.
The most telling sign of this is the tendency of great minds
to see philosophical implications in facts and problems belong-
ing to other fields of learning mathematics, anthropology,
psychology, physics, history, and the arts. Familiar things like
language or dream, or the mensurability of time, appear in new
universal connections which involve highly interesting abstract
issues. Even the layman lends his ear to "semantics" or to new
excitements about "relativity."
Cassirer had all the marks of a great thinker in a new philo-
sophical period. His standpoint was a tradition which he in-
herited the Kantian "critical" philosophy seen in the light of
its later developments, which raised the doctrine of transcen-
dental forms to the level of a transcendental theory of Being.
His writings bear witness that he often reviewed and pondered
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 383
the foundations of this position. There was nothing accidental
or sentimental in his adherence to it; he maintained it through-
out his life, because he found it fruitful, suggestive of new
interpretations. In his greatest works this basic idealism is
implicit rather than under direct discussion; and the turn it
gives to his treatment of the most baffling questions removes it
utterly from that treadmill of purely partisan reiteration and
defense which is the fate of decadent metaphysical convictions.
There is little of polemic or apologetic in Cassirer's writings;
he was too enthusiastic about solving definite problems to spend
his time vindicating his method or discussing what to him was
only a starting-point.
One of the venerable puzzles which he treated with entirely
new insight from his peculiarly free and yet scholarly point
of view is the relation of language and myth. Here we find
at the outset the surprising, unorthodox working of his mind:
for what originally led him to this problem was not the con-
templation of poetry, but of science. For generations the advo-
cates of scientific thinking bemoaned the difficulties which nature
seems to plant in its path the misconceptions bred by "igno-
rance" and even by language itself. It took Cassirer to see
that those difficulties themselves were worth investigating.
Ignorance is a negative condition; why should the mere absence
of correct conceptions lead to w/Vconceptions? And why should
language, supposedly a practical instrument for conveying
thought, serve to resist and distort scientific thought? The
misconceptions interested him.
If the logical and factual type of thought which science de-
i mands is hard to maintain, there must be some other mode of
thinking which constantly interferes with it. Language, the
expression of thought, could not possibly be a hindrance to
thought as such; if it distorts scientific conception, it must do
so merely by giving preference and support to such another
mode.
Now, all thinking is "realistic" in the sense that it deals
with phenomena as they present themselves in immediate
experience. There cannot be a way of thinking that is not true
to the reports of sense. If there are two modes of thinking,
384 SUSANNE K. LANGER
there must be two different modes of perceiving things, of
apprehending the very data of thought. To observe the wind,
for instance, as a purely physical atmospheric disturbance, and
Mnk of it as a divine power or an angry creature would be
purely capricious, playful, irresponsible. But thinking is serious
business, and probably always has been 5 and it is not likely that
language, the physical image of thought, portrays a pattern of
mere fancies and vagaries. In so far as language is incompatible
with scientific reasoning, it must reflect a system of thought that
is soberly true to a mode of experiencing^ of seeing and feeling,
different from our accepted mode of experiencing "facts." 1
This idea, first suggested by the difficulties of scientific
conception, opened up a new realm of epistemological research
to its authorj for it made the forms of misunderstanding take
on a positive rather than a negative importance as archaic forms
of understanding. The hypostatic and poetic tinge of language
which makes it so often recalcitrant to scientific purposes is a
record not only of a different way of thinking, but of seeing,
feeling, conceiving experience a way that was probably para-
mount in the ages when language itself came into being.
The whole problem of mind and its relation to "reality" took
a new turn with the hypothesis that former civilizations may
actually have dealt with a "real world" differently constituted
from our own world of things with their universal qualities
and causal relationships. But how can that older "reality" be
recaptured and demonstrated? And how can the change from
one way of apprehending nature to another be accounted for?
The answer to this methodological question came to him
as a suggestion from metaphysics. "Es ist der Geist der sich
den Korper baut y " said Goethe. And the post-Kantian idealists,
from Fichte to Hermann Cohen, had gone even beyond that
tenet; so they might well have said, "Es ist der Geist der sich
das Weltall baut" To a romanticist that would have been little
more than a figure of speech, expressing the relative importance
of mind and matter. But in Cassirer's bold and uncomplacent
mind such a belief which he held as a basic intellectual postu-
late, not as a value- judgment immediately raised the ques-
1 Cf . Language and Myth> i of.
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 385
tion: How? By what process and what means does the human
spirit construct its physical world?
Kant had already proposed the answer: By supplying the
transcendental constituent of form. Kant regarded this form
as a fixed pattern, the same in all human experience; the cate-
gories of thought which find their clearest expression in science,
seemed to him to govern all empirical experience, and to be
reflected in the structure of language. But the structure of
language is just what modern scientific thought finds uncon-
genial. It embodies a metaphysic of substance and attribute;
whereas science operates more and more with the concept of
junction, which is articulated in mathematics. 2 There is good
reason why mathematicians have abandoned verbal propositions
almost entirely and resorted to a symbolism which expresses
different metaphysical assumptions, different categories of
thought altogether.
At this point Cassirer, reflecting on the shift from substantive
to functional thinking, found the key to the methodological
problem: two different symbolisms revealed two radically dif-
ferent forms of thought; does not every form of Anschauung
have its symbolic mode? Might not an exhaustive study of
symbolic forms reveal just how the human mind, in its various
stages, has variously construed the "reality" with which it dealt?
To construe the equivocally "given" is to construct the phe-
nomenon for experience. And so the Kantian principle, fructified
by a wholly new problem of science, led beyond the Kantian
doctrine to the Philosophy of Symbolic Forms.
The very plan of this work departs from all previous ap-
proaches to epistemology by not assuming either that the
mind is concerned essentially with facts, or that its prime talent
is discursive reason. A careful study of the scientific miscon-
ceptions which language begets revealed the fact that its subject-
predicate structure, which reflects a "natural" ontology of
substance and attribute, is not its only metaphysical trait. Lan-
guage is born of the need for emotional expression. Yet it is
not exclamatory. It is essentially hypostatic, seeking to distin-
guish, emphasize, and hold the object of feeling rather than
* See Substance and Function, Ch. I.
386 SUSANNE K. LANGER
to communicate the feeling itself. To fix the object as a per-
manent focus point in experience is the function of the name.
Whatever evokes emotion may therefore receive a name; and,
if this object is not a thing if it is an act, or a phenomenon
like lightning, or a sound, or some other intangible item ,
the name nevertheless gives it the unity, permanence, and
apparent substantiality of a "thing."
This hypostasis, entailed by the primitive office of language,
really lies deeper even than nomenclature, which merely reflects
it: for it is a fundamental trait of all imagination. The very word
"imagination" denotes a process of image-making. An image
is only an aspect of the actual thing it represents. It may be
not even a completely or carefully abstracted aspect. Its im-
portance lies in the fact that it symbolizes the whole the thing,
person, occasion, or what-not from which it is an abstract.
A thing has a history, an event passes irrevocably away, actual
experience is transient and would exhaust itself in a series of
unique occasions, were it not for the permanence of the symbol
whereby it may be recalled and possessed. Imagination is a
free and continual production of images to "mean" experience
past or present or even merely possible experience.
Imagination is the primary talent of the human mind, the
activity in whose service language was evolved. The imagina-
tive mode of ideation is not "logical" after the manner of
discursive reason. It has a logic of its own, a definite pattern of
identifications and concentrations which bring a very deluge of
ideas, all charged with intense and often widely diverse feelings,
together in one symbol.
Symbols are the indispensable instruments of conception. To
undergo an experience, to react to immediate or conditional
stimuli (as animals react to warning or guiding signs), is not to
"have" experience in the characteristically human sense, which
is to conceive it, hold it in the mind as a so-called "content of
consciousness," and consequently be able to think about it. 3 To
a human mind, every experience a sensation of light or color,
a fright, a fall, a continuous noise like the roar of breakers
Cf. Language and Myth, 38.
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 387
on the beach exhibits, in retrospect, a unity and self-identity
that make it almost as static and tangible as a solid object. By
virtue of this hypostatization it may be referred to> much as an
object may be fainted at; and therefore the mind can think
about it without its actual recurrence. In its symbolic image the
experience is conceived, instead of just physiologically remem-
bered. 4
Cassirer's greatest epistemological contribution is his approach
to the problem of mind through a study of the primitive forms
of conception. His reflections on science had taught him that
all conception is intimately bound to expression; and the forms
of expression, which determine those of conception, are symbolic
forms. So he was led to his central problem, the diversity of
symbolic forms and their interrelation in the edifice of human
culture.
He distinguished, as so many autonomous forms, language,
myth, art, and science. 5 In examining their respective patterns he
made his first startling discovery: myth and language appeared
as genuine twin creatures, born of the same phase of human
mentality, exhibiting analogous formal traits, despite their ob-
vious diversities of content. Language, on the one hand, seems
to have articulated and established mythological concepts,
whereas, on the other hand, its own meanings are essentially
images functioning mythically. The two modes of thought
have grown up together, as conception and expression, respec-
tively, of the primitive human world.
The earliest products of mythic thinking are not permanent,
self-identical, and clearly distinguished "gods;" neither are
they immaterial spirits. They are like dream elements objects
endowed with daemonic import, haunted places, accidental
shapes in nature resembling something ominous all manner of
shifting, fantastic images which speak of Good and Evil, of
Life and Death, to the impressionable and creative mind of
man. Their common trait is a quality that characterizes every-
thing in the sphere of myth, magic, and religion, and also the
4 See An Essay on Man, chapters 2 and 3, fassim.
9 Language and' Myth^ 8,
388 SUSANNE K. LANGER
earliest ethical conceptions the quality of holiness* Holiness
may appertain to almost anything; it is the mystery that appears
as magic, as taboo, as daemonic power, as miracle, and as
divinity. The first dichotomy in the emotive or mythic phase
of mentality is not, as for discursive reason, the opposition of
"yes" and "no," of "a" and "non-a," or truth and falsity; the
basic dichotomy here is between the sacred and the profane.
Human beings actually apprehend values and expressions of
values be-fore they formulate and entertain jacts.
All mythic constructions are symbols of value of life and
power, or of violence, evil, and death. They are charged with
feeling, and have a way of absorbing into themselves more
and more intensive meanings, sometimes even logically conflict-
ing imports. Therefore mythic symbols do not give rise to dis-
cursive understanding; they do beget a kind of understanding,
but not by sorting out concepts and relating them in a distinct
pattern; they tend, on the contrary, merely to bring together
great complexes of cognate ideas, in which all distinctive fea-
tures are merged and swallowed. "Here we find in operation a
law which might actually be called the law of the levelling and
extinction of specific differences," says Cassirer, in Language and,
Myth. "Every part of a whole is the whole itself, every speci-
men is equivalent to the entire species." 7 The significance of
mythic structures is not formally and arbitrarily assigned to
them, as convention assigns one exact meaning to a recognized
symbol; rather, their meaning seems to dwell in them as life
dwells in a body; they are animated by it, it is of their essence,
and the naive, awe-struck mind finds it, as the quality of "holi-
ness." Therefore mythic symbols do not even appear to be
symbols; they appear as holy objects or places or beings, and
their import is felt as an inherent power.
This really amounts to another "law" of imaginative con-
ception. Just as specific differences of meaning are obliterated
in nondiscursive symbolization, the very distinction between
form and content, between the entity (thing, image, gesture, or
6 See Die Philosophie der symbolischen Formen, II,
f Pp. 91-92.
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 389
natural event) which is the symbol, and the idea or feeling
which is its meaning, is lost, or rather: is not yet found. This
is a momentous fact, for it is the basis of all superstition and
strange cosmogony, as well as of religious belief. To believe in
the existence of improbable or quite fantastic things and beings
would be inexplicable folly if beliefs were dictated essentially
by practical experience. But the mythic interpretation of reality
rests on the principle that the veneration appropriate to the
meaning of a symbol is focussed on the symbol itself, which
is simply identified with its import. This creates a world punctu-
ated by pre-eminent objects, mystic centers of power and holi-
ness, to which more and more emotive meanings accrue as
"properties." An intuitive recognition of their import takes the
form of ardent, apparently irrational belief in the physical
reality and power of the significant forms. This is the hypostatic
mechanism of the mind by which the world is filled with
magical things fetishes and talismans, sacred trees, rocks,
caves, and the vague, protean ghosts that inhabit them and
finally the world is peopled with a pantheon of permanent,
more or less anthropomorphic gods. In these presences "reality"
is concentrated for the mythic imagination} this is not "make-
believe," not a willful or playful distortion of a radically differ-
ent "given fact," but is the way phenomena are given to naive
apprehension.
Certainly the pattern of that world is altogether different
from the pattern of the "material" world which confronts our
sober common sense, follows the laws of causality, and exhibits
a logical order of classes and subclasses, with their defining
properties and relations, wherfeby each individual object either
does or does not belong to any given class. Cassirer has summed
up the logical contrast between the mode of mythic intuition and
that of "factual" or "scientific" apprehension in very telling
phrase:
In the realm of discursive conception there reigns a sort of diffuse
light and the further logical analysis proceeds, the further does this
even clarity and luminosity extend. But in the ideational realm of myth
and language there are always, besides those locations from which the
390 SUSANNE K. LANGER
strongest light proceeds, others that appear wrapped in profoundest
darkness. While certain contents of perception become verbal-mythical
centers of force, centers of significance, there are others which remain,
one might say, beneath the threshold of meaning. 8
His coupling of myth and language in this passage brings us
back to the intimate connection between these two great sym-
bolic forms which he traces to a common origin. The dawn of
language was the dawn of the truly human mind, which meets
us first of all as a rather highly developed organ of practical
response and of imagination, or symbolic rendering of impres-
sions. The first "holy objects" seem to be born of momentary
emotional experiences fright centering on a place or a thing,
concentrated desire that manifests itself in a dreamlike image or
a repeated gesture, triumph that issues naturally in festive dance
and song, directed toward a symbol of power. Somewhere in
the course of this high emotional life primitive man took to
using his instinctive vocal talent as a source of such "holy ob-
jects," sounds with imaginative import: such vocal symbols are
names.
In savage societies, names are treated not as conventional ap-
pellations, but as though they were physical proxies for their
bearers. To call an object by an inappropriate name is to con-
found its very nature. In some cultures practically all language
serves mystic purposes and is subject to the most impractical
taboos and regulations. It is clearly of a piece with magic,
religion and the whole pattern of intensive emotional symbolism
which governs the pre-scientific mind. Names are the very es-
sence of mythic symbols; nothing on earth is a more concen-
trated point of sheer meaning than the little, transient, invisible
breath that constitutes a spoken word. Physically it is almost
nothing. Yet it carries more definite and momentous import
than any permanent holy object. 9 It can be invoked at will,
anywhere and at any time, by a mere act of speech; merely
knowing a word gives a person the power of using it; thus it
is invisibly "had," carried about by its possessors.
8 Language and Myth, 9 1 .
* "Often it is the name of the deity, rather than the god himself, that seems
to be the real source of efficacy." (Language and Myth, 48)
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 391
It is characteristic of mythic "powers" that they are com-
pletely contained in every fragment of matter, every sound, and
every gesture which partakes of them. 10 This fact betrays their
real nature, which is not that of physical forces, but of meanings;
a meaning is indeed completely given by every symbol to which
it attaches. The greater the "power" in proportion to its bearer,
the more awe-inspiring will the latter be. So, as long as mean-
ing is felt as an indwelling potency of certain physical objects,
words must certainly rank high in the order of holy things.
But language has more than a purely denotative function.
Its symbols are so manifold, so manageable, and so economical
that a considerable number of them may be held in one "spe-
cious present," though each one physically passes away before
the next is given; each has left its meaning 'to be apprehended
in the same span of attention that takes in the whole series. Of
course, the length of the span varies greatly with different men-
talities. But as soon as two or more words are thus taken together
in the mind of an interpretant, language has acquired its
second function: it has engendered discursive thought, fb"
The discursive mode of thinking is what we usually call
"reason." It is not as primitive as the imaginative mode, because
it arises from the syntactical nature of language; mythic en-
visagement and verbal expression are its forerunners. Yet it is
a natural development from the earlier symbolic mode, which
is pre-discursive, and thus in a strict and narrow sense "pre-
rational."
Henceforth, the history of thought consists chiefly in the
gradual achievement of factual, literal, and logical conception
and expression. Obviously the only means to this end is lan-
guage. But this instrument, it must be remembered, has a double
nature. Its syntactical tendencies bestow the laws of logic on
us; yet the primacy of names in its make-up holds it to the
hypostatic way of thinking which belongs to its twin-phe-
nomenon, myth. Consequently it leads us beyond the sphere of
mythic and emotive thought, yet always pulls us back into it
again; it is both the diffuse and tempered light that shows us
the external world of "fact," and the array of spiritual lamps,
** Cf. Language and Myth, 92.
392 SUSANNE K. LANGER
light-centers of intensive meaning, that throw the gleams and
shadows of the dream world wherein our earliest experiences lay.
We have come so far along the difficult road of discursive
thinking that the laws of logic seem to be the very frame of
the mind, and rationality its essence. Kant regarded the cate-
gories of pure understanding as universal transcendental forms,
imposed by the most naive untutored mind on all its perceptions,
so that self-identity, the dichotomy of "a" and "non-0/' the rela-
tion of part and whole, and other axiomatic general concepts
inhered in phenomena as their necessary conditions. Yet, from
primitive apprehension to even the simplest rational construc-
tion is probably a far cry. It is interesting to see how Cassirer,
who followed Kant in his "Copernican revolution," i.e., in the
transcendental analysis of phenomena which traces their form
to a non-phenomenal, subjective element, broadened the Kan-
tian concept of form to make it a variable and anthropologi-
cally valid principle, without compromising the "critical"
standpoint at all. Instead of accepting one categorial scheme
that of discursive thought as the absolute way of experiencing
reality, he finds it relative to a form of symbolic presentation;
and as there are alternative symbolic forms, there are also al-
ternative phenomenal "worlds." Mythic conception is categori-
ally different from scientific conception; therefore it meets a dif-
ferent world of perceptions. Its objects are not self-identical,
consistent, universally related; they condense many characters in
one, have conflicting attributes and intermittent existence, the
whole is contained in its parts, and the parts in each other. The
world they constitute is a world of values, things "holy" against a
vague background of commonplaces, or "profane" events, in-
stead of a world of neutral physical facts. By this departure, the
Kantian doctrine that identified all conception with discursive
reason, making reason appear as an aboriginal human gift, is
saved from its most serious fallacy, an unhistorical view of mind.
Cassirer called his Essay on Man, which briefly summarizes
the Philosophic der symbolischen Formen y "An Introduction
to a Philosophy of Human Culture." The subtitle is appropriate
indeed; for the most striking thing about this philosophy viewed
as a whole is the way the actual evolution of human customs,
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 393
arts, ideas, and languages is not merely fitted into an idealistic
interpretation of the world (as it may be fitted into almost any
metaphysical picture), but is illumined and made accessible to
serious study by working principles taken from Kantian episte-
mology. His emphasis on the constitutive character of symbolic
renderings in the making of "experience" is the masterstroke
that turns the purely speculative "critical" theory into an
anthropological hypothesis, a key to several linguistic problems,
a source of psychological understanding, and a guidepost in the
maze of Geistesgeschichte.
It is, as I pointed out before, characteristic of Cassirer's
thought that, although its basic principles stem from a philo-
sophical tradition, its living material and immediate inspiration
come from contemporary sources, from fields of research beyond
his own. For many years the metaphysic of mind has been
entirely divorced from the scientific study of mental phe-
nomena} whether mind be an eternal essence or a transient
epiphenomenon, a world substance or a biological instrument,
makes little difference to our understanding of observed human
or animal behavior. But Cassirer breaks this isolation of specula-
tive thought} he uses the Kantian doctrine, that mind is con-
stitutive of the "external world," to explain the way this world
is experienced as well as the mere fact that it is experienced; and
in so doing, of course, he makes his metaphysic meet the test
of factual findings at every turn. His most interesting exhibits
are psychological phenomena revealed in the psychiatric clinic
and in ethnologists' reports. The baffling incapacities of im-
paired brains, the language of childhood, the savage's peculiar
practices, the prevalence of myth in early cultures and its per-
sistence in religious thought these and other widely scattered
facts receive new significance in the light of his philosophy. And
that is the pragmatic measure of any speculative approach. A
really cogent doctrine of mind cannot be irrelevant to psy-
chology, any more than a good cosmological system can be
meaningless for physics, or a theory of ethics inapplicable to
jurisprudence and law.
The psychiatric phenomena which illustrate the existence of a
mythic mode of thought, and point to its ancient and primitive
394 SUSANNE K. LANGER
nature, are striking and persuasive, 11 Among these is the fact
that in certain pathological conditions of the brain the power of
abstraction is lost, and the patient falls back on picturesque
metaphorical language. In more aggravated cases the imagina-
tion, too, is impaired} and here we have a reversion almost to
animal mentality. One symptom of this state which is significant
for the philosophy of symbolism is that the sufferer is unable to
tell a lie, feign any action, or do anything his actual situation
does not dictate, though he may still find his way with immedi-
ate realities. If he is thirtsy, he can recognize and take a glass
of water, and drink j but he cannot pick up an empty glass and
demonstrate the act of drinking as though there were water in
it, or even lift a full glass to his lips, if he is not thirsty. Such
incapacities have been classified as "apractic" disorders} but
Cassirer pointed out that they are not so much practical failures,
as loss of the basic symbolic function, engagement of things
not given. This is borne out by a still more serious disturbance
which occurs with the destruction of certain brain areas, inability
to recognize "things," such as chairs and brooms and pieces of
clothing, directly and instantly as objects denoted by their
names. At this point, pathology furnishes a striking testimony
of the real nature of language: for here, names lose their
hypostatic office, the creation of permanent and particular items
out of the flux of impressions. To a person thus afflicted, words
have connotation, but experience does not readily correspond to
the conceptual scheme of language, which makes names the pre-
eminent points of rest, and requires things as the fundamental
relata in reality. The connoted concepts are apt to be adjectival
rather than substantive. Consequently the world confronting the
patient is not composed of objects immediately "given" in ex-
perience; it is composed of sense data, which he must "associate"
to form "things," much as Hume supposed the normal mind to
do.
Most of the psychological phenomena that caught Cassirer's
interest arose from the psychiatric work of Kurt Goldstein, who
11 For a full treatment of this material see Philosophic der symbolischen For men ^
III, part 3, fassim.
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 395
has dealt chiefly with cases of cerebral damage caused by physi-
cal accident. But the range of psychological researches which bear
out Cassirer's theory of mind is much wider; it includes the
whole field of so-called "dynamic psychology," the somewhat
chaotic store of new ideas and disconcerting facts with which
Sigmund Freud alarmed his generation. Cassirer himself never
explored this fund of corroborative evidence; he found himself
in such fundamental disagreement with Freud on the nature of
the dynamic motive which the psychologist regarded as not
only derived from the sex impulse, but forever bound to it, and
which the philosopher saw liberated in science, art, religion,
and everything that constitutes the "self-realization of the
spirit" that there seemed to be simply no point of contact be-
tween their respective doctrines. Cassirer felt that to Freud all
those cultural achievements were mere by-products of the un-
changing animalian "libido," symptoms of its blind activity and
continual frustration; whereas to him they were the consumma-
tion of a spiritual process which merely took its rise from the
blind excitement of the animal "libido," but received its im-
portance and meanings from the phenomena of awareness and
creativity, the envisagement, reason, and cognition it produced.
This basic difference of evaluations of the life process made
Cassirer hesitate to make any part of Freud's doctrine his own;
at the end of his life he had, apparently, just begun to study the
important relationship between "dynamic psychology" and the
philosophy of symbolic forms.
It is, indeed, only in regard to the forms of thought that a
parallel obtains between these systems; but that parallel is
close and vital, none the less. For, the "dream work" of
Freud's "unconscious" mental mechanism is almost exactly
the "mythic mode" which Cassirer describes as the primitive
form of ideation, wherein an intense feeling is spontane-
ously expressed in a symbol, an image seen in something or
formed for the mind's eye by the excited imagination. Such ex-
pression is effortless and therefore unexhausting; its products
are images charged with meanings, but the meanings remain
implicit, so that the emotions they command seem to be centered
396 SUSANNE K. LANGER
on the image rather than on anything it merely conveys; in the
image, which may be a vision, a gesture, a sound- form (musical
image) or a word as readily as an external object, many mean-
ings may be concentrated, many ideas telescoped and interfused,
and incompatible emotions simultaneously expressed.
The mythic mind never perceives passively, never merely contemplates
things; all its observations spring from some act of participation, some
act of emotion and will. Even as mythic imagination materializes in
permanent forms, and presents us with definite outlines of an 'objective'
world of beings, the significance of this world becomes clear to us only
if we can still detect, underneath it all, that dynamic sense of life from
which it originally arose. Only where this vital feeling is stirred from
within, where it expresses itself as love or hate, fear or hope, joy or
sorrow, mythic imagination is roused to the pitch of excitement at which
it begets a definite world of representations. (Philosofhie der symboli-
schen Formen y II, 90.)
For a person whose apprehension is under the spell of this mythico-
religious attitude, it is as though the whole world were simply annihilated;
the immediate content, whatever it be, that commands his religious in-
terest so completely fills his consciousness that nothing else can exist
beside and apart from it. The ego is spending all its energy on this single
object, lives in it, loses itself in it. Instead of a widening of intuitive
experience, we find here its extreme limitation; instead of expansion
. . . we have here an impulse toward concentration; instead of extensive
distribution, intensive compression. This focussing of all forces on a
single point is the prerequisite for all mythical thinking and mythical
formulation. When, on the one hand, the entire self is given up to a
single impression, is 'possessed' by it and, on the other hand, there is the
utmost tension between the subject and its object, the outer world; when
external reality is not merely viewed and contemplated, but overcomes
a man in sheer immediacy, with emotions of fear or hope, terror or
wish fulfillment: then the spark jumps somehow across, the tension finds
release, as the subjective excitement becomes objectified and confronts
the mind as a god or a daemon. (Language and Myth, 32-33.)
. . . this peculiar genesis determines the type of intellectual content
that is common to language and myth . . . present reality, as mythic or
linguistic conception stresses and shapes it, fills the entire subjective
realm. ... At this point, the word which denotes that thought content
is not a mere conventional symbol, but is merged with its object in an
indissoluble unity. . . . The potential between 'symbol' and 'meaning* is
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 397
resolved; in place of a more or less adequate 'expression,' we find a
relation of identity, of complete congruence between 'image 1 and 'object/
between the name and the thing.
. . . the same sort of hypostatization or transubstantiation occurs in
other realms of mental creativity; indeed, it seems to be the typical process
in all unconscious ideation. (Ibid., 57-58.)
Mythology presents us with a world which is not, indeed, devoid of
structure and internal organization, but which, none the less, is not
divided according to the categories of reality, into 'things' and 'properties.'
Here all forms of Being exhibit, as yet, a peculiar 'fluidity;' they are
distinct without being really separate. Every form is capable of changing,
on the spur of the moment, even into its very opposite. . . . One and
the same entity may not only undergo constant change into sucessive
guises, but it combines within itself, at one and the same instant of its
existence, a wealth of different and even incompatible natures. (Philoso-
phic der symbolischen Formen y III, 71-72.)
Above all, there is a complete lack of any clear division between
mere 'imagining' and 'real' perception, between wish and fulfilment,
between image and object. This is most clearly revealed by the decisive
role which dream experiences play in the development of mythic con-
sciousness. ... It is beyond doubt that certain mythic concepts can be
understood, in all their peculiar complexity, only in so far as one realizes
that for mythic thought and 'experience' there is but a continuous and
fluid transition from the world of dream to objective 'reality.' (Ibid., II,
48-49-)
The world of myth is a dramatic world a world of actions, of
forces, of conflicting powers. In every phenomenon of nature it [mythic
consciousness] sees the collision of these powers. Mythical perception
is always impregnated with these emotional qualities. Whatever is seen
or felt is surrounded by a special atmosphere an atmosphere of joy
or grief, of anguish, of excitement, of exultation or depression. . . . All
objects are benignant or malignant, friendly or inimical, familiar or
uncanny, alluring and fascinating or repellent and threatening. (An
Essay on Man y 76-77.)
The real substratum of myth is not a substratum of thought but of
feeling. ... Its view of life is a synthetic, not an analytical one. . . .
There is no specific difference between the various realms of life. . . .
To mythical and religious feeling nature becomes one great society,
the society of life. Man is not endowed with outstanding rank in this
society. . . . Men and animals, animals and plants are all on the same
level. (Ibid., 81-83.)
398 SUSANNE K. LANGER
To all these passages Freud could subscribe wholeheartedly j
the morphology of the "mythic mode" is essentially that of
dream, phantasy, infantile thinking, and "unconscious" ideation
which he himself discovered and described. And it is the recog-
nition of this non-discursive mode of thought, rather than his
clinical hypothesis of an all-pervading disguised sexuality, that
makes Freud's psychology important for philosophy. Not the
theory of "libido," which is another theory of "animal drives,"
but the conception of the unconscious mechanism through which
the "libido" operates, the dream work, the myth-making process
that is the new generative idea which psychoanalysis con-
tributed to psychological thinking, the notion that has put
modern psychology so completely out of gear with traditional
epistemology that the science of mind and the philosophy of
mind threatened to lose contact altogether. So it is of the utmost
significance for the unity of our advancing thought that pure
speculative philosophy should recognize and understand the
primary forms of conception which underlie the achievement of
discursive reason.
Cassirer's profound antipathy to Freud's teaching rests on
another aspect of that psychological system, which springs from
the fact that Freud's doctrine was determined by practical inter-
ests: that is the tendency of the psychoanalyst to range all
human aims, all ideals on the same ethical level. Since he deals
entirely with the evils of social maladjustment, his measure of
good is simply adjustment} religion and learning and social
reform, art and discovery and philosophical reflection, to him
are just so many avenues of personal gratification sublimation
of passions, emotional self-expression. From his standpoint they
cannot be viewed as objective values. Just as good poetry and
bad poetry are of equal interest and importance to the psycho-
analyst, so the various social systems are all equally good, all
religions equally true (or rather, equally false, but salutary),
and all abstract systems of thought, scientific or philosophical or
mathematical, just self-dramatizations in disguise. To a phi-
losopher who was also a historian of culture, such a point of view
seemed simply devastating. It colored his vision of Freud's work
so deeply that it really obscured for him the constructive aspect,
THEORY OF LANGUAGE AND MYTH 399
the analysis of non-discursive ideation, which this essentially
clinical psychology contains. Yet the relationship between the
new psychiatry and his own new epistemology is deep and close;
"der Mythos als Denkform" is the theme that rounds out the
modern philosophical picture of human mentality to embrace
psychology and anthropology and linguistics, 13 which had
broken the narrow limits of rationalist theory, in a more ade-
quate conceptual frame.
The broadening of the philosophical outlook achieved by
Cassirer's theory of language and myth affects not only the
philosophical sciences, the Geisteswissenschaften, but also the
most crucial present difficulty in philosophy itself the ever in-
creasing pendulum arc between theories of reason and theories
of irrational motivation. The discovery that emotive, intuitive,
"blind" forces govern human behavior more effectively than
motives of pure reason naturally gave rise to an anti-rationalist
movement in epistemology and ethics, typified by Nietzsche,
William James, and Bergson, which finally made the truth-
seeking attitude of science a pure phantasmagoria, a quixotic
manifestation of the will. Ultimately the role of reason came to
appear (as it does in Bergson's writings) as something entirely
secondary and essentially unnatural. But at this point the exist-
ence of reason becomes an enigma: for how could instinctive life
ever give rise to such a product? How can sheer imagination and
volition and passion beget the "artificial" picture of the world
which seems natural to scientists?
Cassirer found the answer in the structure of language; for
language stems from the intuitive "drive" to symbolic expres-
sion that also produces dream and myth and ritual, but it is a
pre-eminent form in that it embodies not only self-contained,
complex meanings, but a principle of concatenation whereby the
complexes are unravelled and articulated. It is the discursive
character of language, its inner tendency to grammatical de-
" This is the title of the first section in Vol. II of Philosophic der symbolischen
Formen.
"The knowledge of linguistics on which he bases vol. I of his Philosophic
der symbolischen Formen is almost staggering. His use of anthropological data
may be found especially throughout vol. II of that work.
400 SUSANNE K. LANGER
velopment, which gives rise to logic in the strict sense, i.e., to the
procedure we call "reasoning." Language is "of imagination all
compact," yet it is the cradle of abstract thought; and the
achievement of Vernunft, as Cassirer traces it from the dawn of
human mentality through the evolution of speech forms, is just
as natural as the complicated patterns of instinctive behavior and
emotional abreaction.
Here the most serious antinomy in the philosophical thought
of our time is resolved. This is a sort of touchstone for
the philosophy of symbolic forms, whereby we may judge its
capacity to fulfill the great demand its author did not hesitate
to make on it, when he wrote in his Essay on Man:
In the boundless multiplicity and variety of mythical images, of reli-
gious dogmas, of linguistic forms, of works of art, philosophic thought
reveals the unity of a general function by which all these creations are
held together. Myth, religion, art, language, even science, are now
looked upon as so many variations on a common theme and it is the
task of philosophy to make this theme audible and understandable.
SUSANNE K. LANGER
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
12
Witt* M. Urban
CASSIRER'S PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE
12
CASSIRER'S PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE
C^RNST CASSIRER is, in my opinion, the first of modern
1 d philosophers to see the full significance of the relations
of problems of language to problems of philosophy and, there-
fore, the first also to develop a philosophy of language in the
full sense of the word. Others, it is true, had made important
contributions without which the more systematic treatment of
Cassirer would have been impossible. In the field of linguistics
itself contributions of a philosophical nature had become more
and more frequent, and of these Cassirer has made full use, his
erudition in this field being such as to command our admiration.
In the field of the special sciences scientists had become increas-
ingly aware of the problems of methodology which their lan-
guages and symbolisms present, and with these Cassirer is
equally familiar. For these reasons, no less than because of his
own philosophical acumen, he has been enabled, not only to
formulate the problems of a philosophy of language in a sys-
tematic fashion but also, as I believe, in general to find the right
solutions.
It is because of the outstanding character of his work that
his philosophy of language becomes of great importance, not
only for the understanding of his own philosophy, but for the
equally significant purpose of understanding the role which
philosophies of language play in the life of modern philosophy
as a whole. It is because of this outstanding character that the
present writer has learned so much from this philosophy of
language and is glad, therefore, to undertake the task of pre-
senting it for this volume. Cassirer's treatment of language is so
403
404 WILBUR M. URBAN
fundamental for his philosophy as a whole that it is impossible
to present it without trenching, to some extent at least, upon
topics assigned to other contributors. It is to be hoped that where
this is inevitable, it will serve to clarify rather than to confuse
the important issues in modern science and philosophy, to the
solution of which this study of Cassirer's philosophy should con-
stitute an important contribution.
B
The chief source of Cassirer's philosophy of language is his
monumental work, Philosophie der symbolischen Formen? the
first volume of which is devoted exclusively to the philosophical
study of language, the second to the language of myth, and the
third to the language of science. All three are, in Cassirer's
terminology, "symbolic forms," and it is the interrelations of
these three forms which constitute the central problem of the
work as a whole.
The relation of this work to his earlier investigations will
perhaps best serve to indicate its standpoint. The investigations
of Substanzbegriff und Funktionsbegriff, so he tells us, pro-
ceeded from the assumption that the basal conception of knowl-
edge (and its essential law) shows itself most clearly in the field
of mathematics and mathematical natural science, where the
highest stage of universality and necessity is achieved. The
Philosophic der symbolischen Formen> however, goes beyond
this earlier standpoint in both content and method. It seeks to
show that "theoretical and form elements" are not confined to
scientific construction, but are found also in the "natural world
picture" and in the constructions of the imagination, mythical,
aesthetic, etc. 2 This statement of the problem, formulated as it
is in terms of the Kantian idiom, serves also to indicate the
relation of the philosophy of symbolic forms to the critical
idealism of Kant. Cassirer accepts, he tells us, the critical prin-
ciples of Kant, but extends them to other spheres than the
theoretical, widening the Kantian conception of "form" to the
1 Die Philosophic der symbolischen Formen (Berlin, 1929) j hereafter abbreviated :
PSF.
*PSF., Ill, v.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 405
more general notion of symbolic form. 8 Otherwise expressed,
the Kritik der Vernunft, in its various forms, becomes a Kritik
der Sfrache, in its various forms and symbolic expressions. Such
a critique was, indeed, like many other developments in philoso-
phy since Kant, already implicit in the Kantian philosophy; it
has been Cassirer's task, as well as his good fortune, to have
made this explicit.
II
The Theme of a Philosophy of Language, according
to Cassirer
A
The chief reason why Cassirer is able to develop a philosophy
of language of such significance is, I believe, because he formu-
lates the theme of such a philosophy in the main with truth and
adequacy. 4
This theme, stated in Hegelian terms, which, as we shall
see, are not foreign to Cassirer's way of thinking, may be said
to be "language as the actuality of culture." "Language," he
tells us, "stands in a focal point of spiritual being, in which rays
of entirely differing origin unite and from which lines run into
all the realms of the spirit." Of these various realms, these
ways in which culture actualizes itself, the theoretical or sci-
entific form is that in which knowledge chiefly manifests itself,
and it is with this language that philosophy is, if not solely, yet
chiefly concerned; but there are other ways and other languages,
and the knowledge value of these becomes also part of the
problem of a philosophy of language. Thus the critique of lan-
guage becomes, so he holds, the basis of the critique of knowl-
edge, the basal theme of a philosophy of language being the
"Erkenntniswert der Sprache."*
B
The theme of these three volumes is not an arbitrary pro-
9 1 but., I, 9 ff } also III, 7 ff.
4 Ibid., I, Preface.
5 Ibid., I, Einleitung und Problemstellung, 1-4.1.
406 WILBUR M. URBAN
nouncement, as is the case of so many current dicta on language,
but is shown to have developed out of the history of philosophic
thought itself. Chapter I of Vol. I is entitled "Das Sprachpro-
blem in der Geschichte der Philosophic."
Histories of philosophy have, in the main, either ignored or
been unaware of the philosophies of language presupposed by
the great philosophers. With his more than ordinary historical
erudition, Cassirer has been enabled to rewrite the history of
European philosophy from this standpoint. In making explicit
the assumptions or presuppositions regarding language on the
part of the philosophers, and in showing how they predeter-
mined in various ways the results of their thinking, Cassirer has
enabled us to see the central place of problems of language in
the entire history of philosophy.
From Plato on (he speaks of the famous Seventh Epistle as
the first attempt made to determine the Erkenntniswert der
Sprache in a purely methodological manner) the "value of the
word" becomes, either explicitly or implicitly, an essential part
of the problem of knowledge. The outstanding phenomenon
from this point of view, is, of course, the opposition of nominal-
ism and realism, each representing, so to speak, a fundamental
evaluation of the word.
The opposition of rationalism and empiricism in modern phi-
losophy is, in a sense, the continuation of the same problem. The
ideal of a lingua universalis y held by Descartes and Leibnitz, to
say nothing of lesser rationalists, was an expression of the ideal
of universal reason; logos, in the sense of language, and in the
sense of reason, being, for all of this way of thinking, in prin-
ciple inseparable. Empiricism, on the other hand, proceeds, as
Cassirer tells us, from a completely opposite standpoint and
reaches contrary results. Although recognizing, as did Locke,
that problems of knowledge cannot be separated from language,
it starts with the assumption that the primary form of knowl-
edge is simple awarness of sense data, to which language is a
mere addendum. The empirical philosophy of language be-
comes the basis for a theory of knowledge which seeks to
eliminate the universal} Berkeley even proposing "to confine
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 407
his thought to his own ideas divested from words," believing
that thus he "cannot then be mistaken."
As the Kantian "critical" philosophy represents the media-
tion between rationalism and empiricism in epistemology, so
philosophies of language, influenced by the Kantian criticism,
represent a crucial point in connection with the speech problem
in the history of philosophy. In this respect von Humboldt
played an outstanding part and has consequently had a deter-
mining influence upon Cassirer himself; an entire section being
given to the discussion of his main principles. For von Hum-
boldt language is not a product (ergon) but an activity,
(energeia). The Kantian principle of knowledge as synthesis is
carried over into the sphere of language, "Sfrache als Schof-
fung und Entwicklung" the title of a work of Karl Vossler to
which Cassirer refers with approval, representing this "idealis-
tic" tendency in the modern philosophy of language.
Of the relation of this general problem to current tendencies
in philosophy Cassirer is fully aware, and his own position is
mainly determined by his reaction to these tendencies. Modern
empiricism, in its positivistic form, and the Bergsonian philoso-
phy of organism, both proceed from a purely naturalistic and
nominalistic theory of language, and to the premises and con-
clusions of both Cassirer is in complete opposition. There are,
he tells us, in general only two ways of solving the problem of
language and reality. The first of these assumes a reality known
independently of language and its categories, a hypothetical
pure experience to be discovered by stripping off language.
The second way proposes an exactly opposite method and pro-
ceeds upon opposite presuppositions. Instead of attempting to
get back of the forms of thought and language to a hypothetical
pure experience, it assumes that experience is never pure in this
sense and that intuition and expression are inseparable. It there-
fore proposes, not to deny, but to complete and perfect the
principles of expression and symbolism. It proceeds upon the
assumption that the more richly and energetically the human
spirit builds its languages and symbolisms the nearer it comes, if
not to some hypothetical original source of its being, certainly to
408 WILBUR M. URBAN
its ultimate meaning and reality. This is the idealistic minimum
in Cassirer's philosophy of language, as indeed it must be, in
the view of the present writer, in any adequate philosophy of
language.
Ill
Cassirer y s "Idealistic" Theory of Language: Criticism of
Naturalism in Linguistic Science
A
One thing which distinguishes Cassirer's philosophy of
language from most contributions to this subject is his extensive
use of the results of linguistic science, an advantage conspicu-
ously absent in most discussions of the subject. Not only does he
appeal to these studies in detail for the substantiation of his main
theses, but he examines the postulates and method of modern
linguistics.
The assumption underlying the linguistic science of the nine-
teenth century and most philosophies of language had ac-
cepted this assumption is that language is but a part of nature.
As such, it was made by nature for certain natural ends for
the manipulation of physical objects or for adjustment to the
physical environment. In other words, linguistic science has
tended to study language, so to speak, within the bounds of
naturalistic assumptions alone. Cassirer challenges this stand-
point, not only from the point of view of "critical" philosophy,
but from the standpoint of linguistic science itself. An important
part of his entire approach to problems of language is his
account of the stages in the development of modern linguistics,
which not only constitutes one of the most complete pictures of
that science, but also enables him to disprove many of the as-
sumptions, regarding matter of fact, all too common in modern
positivistic philosophy.
Linguistics, so Cassirer tells us, hoping to attain the same
certainty and exactness as the natural sciences, moulded itself,
in the first instance, on their methods and conceptions. But
gradually the notion of "laws," physical, physiological, and
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 409
even psychological, showed itself untenable. The entire con-
ception of nature and natural law upon which it was sought to
build, turned out to be an illusion, a wholly fictitious unity
including the most disparate elements. Thus, as the naturalistic
and positivistic scheme of linguistic science has tended to break
up, there has been also a marked tendency towards the return
to earlier conceptions of the autonomy of language. The move-
ment within linguistics as a whole, so it seems to Cassirer, has
been, methodologically speaking, a movement in a circle. A
revision of the naturalistic assumptions of the science has taken
place to such an extent that it is again approaching the stand-
point from which it started. As under the aegis of the physical
and biological sciences, it took the step from Geist to Natur y
so now in a very real sense it is turning again from nature to
spirit. This is the significance of the opposition of idealism and
positivism in modern linguistics. 6
B
With the return from nature to mind, the problem of mean-
ing becomes central, and a corollary of the return movement is
the methodological principle of the primacy of meaning d,er
Primat des Sinnes, as Cassirer calls it. It may be stated in the
following way. The sole entrance to the understanding of lan-
guage is through meaning, for meaning is the sine qua non of
linguistic fact. Language for modern linguistics is not sound,
nor again the motor and tactual sensations which make up the
word psychologically, nor yet the associations called up; it is
the meaning itself which, although conditioned by these, is not
identical with any of them. This being the fact, the methodology
of linguistic study is not that of the natural sciences but rather,
for language, as for all symbolic forms, the phenomenological.
The nature of this method, as conceived by Cassirer, will be
stated more definitely presently; the significant point here is
that it is interpretation from within, not merely explanation
from without.
The significance of this principle of the primacy of meaning
'PSF., I. 118 flF.
410 WILBUR M. URBAN
is far reaching. It means negatively, as we have seen, the denial
of the adequacy of external approaches to language, whether
physical, physiological, or even psychological; but it involves
also, positively, significant changes in methodology. Earlier
methods proceeded from the elements to the whole from the
sounds to the words, from words to sentences, and finally to
the meaning of discourse as a whole. The present tendency is
the exact opposite. It proceeds from the whole of meaning, as
Gestalty to the sentences and words as elements the parts be-
ing understood through the whole. The spirit which lives in
human discourse works as a totality constituting the sentence
or proposition, the copula, the word, and the sound. 7
Of the many important consequences of this methodological
principle a discussion of the details of which would be neces-
sary for an adequate account of Cassirer's linguistic studies
we shall single out one which is important for all that follows,
namely the nature and modes of linguistic meaning.
Meaning, as understood by positivistic theories, is reference
to sensuously observable entities. "Indication" is, therefore,
the essence of meaning, "in the strict sense." All other mean-
ings are emotive in character, and the words in this case refer
to nothing and stand for nothing. For Cassirer indication is
indeed a primary mode, but equally primary is representation
or Darstellung.* Without this element there is no linguistic
meaning. This element or function is an Urfhanomen, present
in language from its simplest to its highest forms, and it is, as
we shall see, the development of this mode of meaning from
copy through analogy, to symbolic representation which con-
stitutes the thread of Cassirer's treatment, not only of language
but of the entire range of symbolic forms.
Closely bound up with this question as to what language is are
the genetic problems of language, more specifically the prob-
lem of "animal language." Holding, as he does, that the
Darstellungsfanktion is the sine qua non of linguistic meaning,
he denies this function to the phonetic expressions of animals,
11 ibid., i, n 9 .
9 Ibid., I, i26ff } III, n6ff.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 411
even those of the higher apes. His discussion of the results of
Kohler's investigations are most enlightening, and he concludes
that recent observations of animal psychology seem to widen
rather than narrow the gulf between human and animal com-
munication, and that what is called animal speech "seems to be
permanently held fast in the pre-linguistic stage." 9 In any
case, it is the growing conviction of linguistics that the hiatus
between animal expressions and human speech is widening
rather than narrowing as investigation proceeds all of which
leads to the modern speech notion as "a human, non-instinctive
function." The step to human language is made first when the
pure meaningful sound achieves supremacy over the affective
stimulus-born sounds and this achievement has in it the charac-
ter of a unique level of being. The notion of speech as an
Urphanomen, in short the autonomy of the speech notion,
seems to be more and more confirmed by the study of animal
psychology.
Cassirer's philosophy of language has been called "idealistic,"
and in the sense that it is opposed to naturalism and positivism
it is. Language is, indeed, to use an expression of Karl Vossler,
"embedded in nature," and it is out of this fact that "the illusion
of its being a piece of nature constantly arises." But Cassirer
would agree with Vossler that this illusion must be just as
constantly dispelled if an adequate philosophy of language is
to be possible. Language is indeed a part of nature and as such
it was "made" for certain natural ends. But in its development
it subserves quite other ends. Granted that it was made by
nature for a natural object, language like our intelligence, and
all the forms of culture with which it is connected, has de-
veloped along lines which are independent of natural ends,
perhaps in opposition to them. Language is not limited to the
"practical" functions for which it was primarily made, but in
its development has achieved a freedom which makes it, in the
words of von Humboldt, "a vehicle for traversing the manifold
and the highest and deepest of the entire world."
9 Ibtd.y I, 136 note} III, 127,
412 WILBUR M. URBAN
IV
Language and Cognition: The Relation of Intuition
to Expression
A
As opposed to purely naturalistic and positivistic theories of
language Cassirer's theory is idealistic. But it may be said to
be idealistic in another sense, in the Kantian sense of "critical
idealism." This general "critical" position is determinative
throughout j it underlies his conception of language in Vol. I,
his conception of language and myth in Vol. II, and his inter-
pretation of science in Vol. III. It is, however, with the first,
the general question of the relation of language to cognition,
that we are now concerned.
The problem of knowledge presents itself to Cassirer, as to
all "critical" philosophers, under a double aspect, the psycho-
logical and the epistemological. In the psychological or natural-
istic treatment, as in the application of the "scientific" method
everywhere, the only possible standpoint is to start with the
"things" or objects, as already constructed, and then ask how
they acquire meaning and are known. The petitio principii in
this method is, for Cassirer, obvious. It assumes that the things
or objects are given and are then known, when actually there
is an element of construction, perhaps incalculable, in the things
as given. The epistemological treatment of the subject starts
from an entirely different, perhaps opposite, standpoint. It
involves a radical shift from the realm of things to that of
meaning and value. It must study perception and perceptual
meaning, not causally, as determined from without, but from
within, as a constitutive element in cognition. 10 If it is really
"meaning that transforms sense data into things," it then be-
comes a problem whether language and linguistic meaning are
not present in the first processes of such transformation. Cassirer
holds that language is thus present from the beginning, and
that in this sense language first created the realm of meaning.
Otherwise expressed, intuition and expression are, if not identi-
cal, as according to Croce, at least inseparable.
1 , in, 68ff.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 413
In this connection we may note a term constantly used by
Cassirer, the full significance of which will later become ap-
parent, namely, the expression Ausdruckserlebnisse. The pri-
mary experiences (Erlebnisse) are at the same time primary
forms of expression and constitute the "natural" world picture,
as well as the picture constructed by myth. These are the origi-
nal forms of knowledge and in these, according to Cassirer's
"critical" principles, there are already "theoretical and form
elements" which contribute their elements to knowledge.
Science, it is true, tends to transcend, and in a sense "break
through," these forms of expression} but that very fact creates
one of the fundamental problems of a philosophy of language
and of symbolic forms, namely, the Erkenntniswert of these
A usdruckserlebnisse.
B
Intuition is inseparable from expression, but in expression
there is always an element of re-presentation j die Darstellungs-
junktion is equally original das symbolische Grundverhaltnis>
as he calls it. This is described as the bi-polar character of all
knowledge and is, in Cassirer's terms, an Urphanomen.
Empiricism, with its doctrine of presentational immediacy, pro-
ceeds on the assumption that the primary and original form of
knowledge is one in which we merely h<we y or possess, the sense
data. Such an hypothetical form of knowledge is, for Cassirer,
pure myth. Without the element of polarity, and therefore of
the reference of the presentation to that which is presented, that
is without some element of representation, the entire notion of
knowledge collapses. It follows from this that problems of
knowledge and problems of language are inseparable. 11
In connection with this fundamental principle two specific
points in the development of Cassirer's thesis require special
attention. They are treated by him under the two captions, Z#r
Pathologie des Symbolbewusstseins and the notion of Symbol-
ischer Pragnanz^ both of which serve to illuminate the general
principle.
11 This thesis is the underlying" theme of the entire Philosophic der symbolischen
Formen y but is especially developed in Vol. Ill, Part i. A statement of it is found
on pp. 1436*.
414 WILBUR M. URBAN
Under the former, the pathology of the symbol-conscious-
ness, he makes use of the phenomena of mental blindness, in its
verbal form, as studied by both psychologists and linguists.
When in certain forms of aphasia the word is not recognized or
cannot be formed, the perceptual meaning of the object itself
is absent also facts which go far towards confirming the princi-
ple that language is part of the perceptual process itself. 12 The
significance of speech for the construction (Aujbau) of the per-
ceptual world, to employ Cassirer's terms, is obvious.
The notion of Symbolischer Pragnanz is equally important
for his general thesis, important not only for his philosophy of
language, but for his theory of symbolism. By this term is to be
understood, he tells us, the way in which perception, as sensu-
ous experience, becomes at the same time the means of appre-
hension (symbolically) of a non-intuitive meaning and brings
this meaning to immediate and concrete expression. 13 Thus a
color phenomenon is, as sense datum, a sensuous experience, but
it is also a symbol which stands for references and meanings
which themselves are not objects of sensuous experience. This
symbolic character is, as we shall see, present, in Cassirer's view,
on the lowest levels of experience as well as on the highest j it
extends, in his words, through every level of the world picture.
In sum, this symbolic function, like the DarsteHungsfanktion y
of which it is an aspect, is an Urfhanomen.
The function of language in the Aujbau of the perceptual
world is further shown by the presence of the universal in the
perceptual process itself. Everything denoted by language is
already universalized. Apart from purely formless interjec-
tions and emotive sounds, all linguistic expressions contain
implicitly this "form of thought." The universal is not, as com-
monly held, the product of abstraction and then embodied in
language 5 it is present in this "first precipitate of language."
PSF, III, chapter VI.
11 Of. cit. y Vol. Ill, p. 234. In Cassirer's own words, "Unter 'symbolischer
Pragnanz' soil also die Art verstanden werden, in der ein Wahrnehmungserlebniss,
als 'sinnliches* Erlebniss, zugleich einen bestimmten nicht-anschaulichen 'Sinn* in
sich fasst imd ihn zur unmittlebaren konkreten Darstellung bringt."
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 415
The later processes of abstraction take place upon contents al-
ready thus universalized.
In developing this point Cassirer makes use of Lotze's term,
"first" or primary universal, to distinguish it from the secondary
or abstract universal. Nouns, verbs, adjectives are all in a
sense names, and when anything is named this first universal is
implicit. This first universal is intuitive, of a very different
nature from the ordinary class concepts of logic, and is, indeed,
presupposed by them. Perception contains this universal. It is
true, of course, that it is always a particular color or tone that is
perceived, always a particular quote and intensity. But this per-
ception is always accompanied by the fact that every other color
or tone has an equal right to function as an example of the uni-
versal. This class concept is, as he further insists, not constructed
by repressing or eliminating the individual color or tone, but
rather by the recognition of a common element (in the indi-
vidual phenomena themselves) already intuited. 14
This doctrine of the "double universal," as Cassirer calls it,
is important for his entire philosophy of language. It also fur-
nishes the basis for his theory of language and logic. His logical
theory will doubtless receive fuller treatment by other con-
tributors to this volume, but some comment should be made
upon it in this connection.
The point at which logic and the philosophy of language, so
he tells us, first touch each other is the problem of the forma-
tion of concepts; the point, indeed, "at which they disclose
their inseparable character." "All logical analysis of concepts,"
he adds, "seems to lead in the end to a point at which the
examination of concepts passes into that of words and names.
From this point of view logic might be defined as the science
or doctrine of the concept and its meaning." 15 Predication is a
problem at once linguistic and logical and the real secret of
predication is found in the doctrine of the double universal.
Predication, in the logical sense, is but the conceptual expres-
sions of relations already intuited. These form the basis for the
more complex syntheses of logical thought, logical concepts
14 PSF, I, 249*F. Also III, i 35 ff.
"Ibid., I, 2 44 ff.
416 WILBUR M. URBAN
having the function merely of fixing the relations already
present in experience. The logical concept, so he tells us, does
nothing else than fix the "gesetzliche Ordnung* already present
in the phenomena themselves; it states consciously the rule
which the perception follows unconsciously. 16
Cassirer seems to maintain a relational, as opposed to a
subject-predicate logic, and his general thesis of the develop-
ment from substance to function in the sphere of scientific
knowledge would seem to indicate this position. It would seem
also, that with regard to the issue raised by the expression
"logical analysis of language," he also maintains the right of
such a relational logic to exercise its critique upon the subject-
predicate logic, which is the constitutive element in the natural
world picture as given us by perception. And yet I am not so
sure. Certainly one of his main positions is that the mathemati-
cal-logical world picture given us by science is not the only
symbolic form which has knowledge value, but that such value
must be accorded also to the natural and mythical pictures of
the world. In any case, I cannot go into this issue here. It was
one of my hopes that this ambiguity regarding logic would
be cleared up in Cassirer's answers to the questions raised by the
essays in this volume, before the suddenness and untimeliness
of his death made this expectation futile.
D
As the Darstellungsfunktion is the sine qua non of linguistic
meaning, so the nature of that function, of the relation of the
"word" to the "thing" and the nature of the truth relation in
general becomes a fundamental problem of a philosophy of
language. "The function of language," according to Cassirer,
"is not to copy reality but to symbolize it." 17
In this connection his "law" of the development of language
becomes of first importance. The development of language
proceeds through three stages. They are (a) the mimetic or copy
stage, (b) the analogical and (c) the symbolic. The characteris-
T Ibid., I, i 3 2ff 2 33 ff.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 417
tic of the first stage is that between the word, or verbal sign,
and the thing to which it refers no real difference is made. The
word is the thing. This initial stage is, however, broken up as
soon as transfer of signs takes place. Here the relation is ana-
logical. This relation in turn gives way to the symbolic. The
characteristic of this last stage is that, whereas the element of
representation (Darstellung), which is the sine qua non of
linguistic meaning, still remains, the relation of similarity
which conditions this representation becomes more and more
partial and indefinite.
As thus briefly stated, this "law" of development is, to be
sure, a mere schematism; but when it is filled in with the rich
content at Cassirer's disposal, it becomes one of the most illumi-
nating conceptions of his entire work. It becomes not only an
important principle for the understanding of the Aufbw der
Sprache, but one which also enables him to connect the develop-
ment of language with other "symbolic forms," such as art,
science, and religion. '
As concerns language itself, Cassirer is enabled, as the result
of extensive comparative studies, to show the presence of this
tendency or "law" throughout linguistic phenomena. From this
wealth of material I choose but one illustration to indicate the
significance of the principle, namely, the phenomenon of re-
duplication common in primitive languages. The reduplication
of sound or syllable appears, at first view, to involve merely
the copying of the object or happening. Actually, however, it
marks the beginning of an analogical representation which is a
step on the way to the symbolic. The representation is, in the
first instance, imitative and serves to conjure up the thing itself.
Gradually, however, the Gestalt is detached from the primary
material and becomes the means of representation of plurality,
repetition, and finally, in many cases, becomes the form of
representation or expression of the fundamental intuitions,
space, time, force, etc. Cassirer develops this theme with many
illustrations which cannot, of course, be given here. The im-
portant point is the presence of the representative, as well as
the indicative function, from the beginning, and also the manner
4i8 WILBUR M. URBAN
in which this representative function develops from representa-
tion in the sense of imitation to symbolic representation as its
ultimate form. 18
It is impossible even to indicate here the manifold applica-
tions of this principle to the development of the various speech
forms. More important for his philosophy as a whole is the
way in which, as he points out, the development of language
through the three stages makes it possible for speech to become
the medium for the expression of conceptual thought and of
pure relations. It is indeed the very Vieldeutigkeit of the verbal
signs, which appears on the analogical stage of development,
that constitutes the real virtue of that stage of development.
It is precisely this that compels the mind to take the decisive step
from the concrete function of indication (Eezeichnung)^ which
characterizes the early stage of language, to the general and
more significant function of "meaning" (Bedeutung). It is at
this point that language at the same time emerges from the
sensuous husk in which it first embodied itself. The imitative
and analogical expressions give place to the purely symbolic, and
language thus becomes the bearer of a newer and deeper
spiritual content. 19
Of special importance in this connection is the application
of this principle to space-time language, not only for the entire
philosophy of symbolic forms, but more especially for Cassirer's
treatment of symbolism in science. All language goes through
these three stages of development, and space-time words are
no exception to the rule. Into the details of his exhaustive study
we cannot, of course, enter. It must suffice to give the results
as summed up in his own words: "Again it is clear," he tells us,
that the concepts of space, time and number furnish the actual structural
elements of objective experience as they build themselves up in language.
But they can fulfil this task only because, according to their total struc-
ture, they keep it an ideal medium, precisely because, while they keep
to the form of sensuous experience, they progressively fill the sensuous
with ideal content and make it the symbol of the spiritual. 20
, I f i 43 .
, 145.
"7M&.L *oft.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 419
Thus the space and time of the immediate Ausdruckserlebnisse
become the ideal space-time of modern physical science which,
as we shall see, although keeping the forms of sensuous experi-
ence, become more and more the symbol for non-intuitable
relations. 21
The theme of a philosophy of language is, as we have seen,
the Erkenntniswert der Sprache. To the question thus raised
Cassirer's critical idealistic philosophy of language seems to me
to be in the main, the right answer. As opposed to naively
naturalistic and "realistic" views of language, this conception of
language seems to me to be alone tenable. Nevertheless there
also appear to me to be certain difficulties in Cassirer's formula-
tion of this theory a fundamental ambiguity in his evaluation
of language which becomes increasingly puzzling as he passes
from the philosophy of language eo nomme to other aspects of
the more general philosophy of symbolic forms.
There seems to be little question of the inseparability of
intuition and expression embodied in the notion of Ausdrucks-
erlebnisse, that language is present from the beginning in the
Aufbau of the perceptual world. There seems to be just as
little question that language develops from copy to analogy
and from analogy to symbol; that the function of language is
not to copy reality but to symbolize it; and that, more and more,
the symbolization of things gives place to the symbolization of
relations. The problem then becomes whether, in this dialecti-
cal movement, as Cassirer calls it, inherent in language, the
goal of the movement is the abandonment of language with its
natural "parts of speech" and its subject-predicate logic for a
symbolism of pure relations and a purely relational logic. Is
there within language itself an immanental dialectic which
drives it ever onward beyond itself? Otherwise expressed, are
the natural categories of language, although useful for practice,
wholly erroneous when applied to the sphere of theory?
On this fundamental issue Cassirer's answer seems to me to
be ambiguous. In many places he appears to suggest that the
* Ibid., 'Ill, Part III, Chap. V.
420 WILBUR M. URBAN
function of thought is to break through the husk of language,
with its natural categories (of subject and predicate, of substance
and attribute) to a "purer notation" and to a symbolism of pure
relations, notably in science. In other places he seems to suggest
that, although this is the ideal goal of knowledge, natural
language can never be broken through completely and the cate-
gories of this language can never be completely transcended.
Doubtless Cassirer is clear on this point, and my own uncer-
tainty arises from defects of understanding. In any case, the
problem here presented is one which faces all modern philoso-
phies of language, a problem to which, in the opinion of the
present writer, few have given really satisfactory answers.
The Philosophy of Language and The Philosophy of Symbolic
Forms. Principles of Symbolism
A
For Cassirer, then, the philosophy of language leads directly
to a philosophy of symbolism. If, as he maintains, the function
of language is not to copy reality but to symbolize it, it becomes
necessary, in order to understand that function, to understand
also the nature and principles of symbolism. More than this,
language is for him not the only symbolic form. In art, religion,
and preeminently in "science" itself, non-linguistic symbols are
employed and the relation of these symbols to language becomes
one of the central problems of the philosophy of language, as
viewed in its more general aspects.
Cassirer's problem, as we have seen, insofar as it is concerned
with language, is the study of the Aufbau der Sprache in connec-
tion with the development of the varied forms of culture, more
particularly science, art, and religion. The essence of culture is
precisely this objectification of the "spirit" in various forms and
structures. In all these, no less than in science in the strict sense
of the word, theoretical and form elements are to be found.
The methodology of such a study, even in the case of
language itself, obviously can not be the scientific method in the
sense of natural science, as we have already seen in his critique
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 421
of the assumptions and methods of linguistics. It is, for Cassirer,
the phenomenological method conceived in the broadest sense.
The place in his studies where the character of this method is
most clearly formulated is in the Preface to Vol. III. "When,"
he writes, "I speak of the phenomenology of knowledge, I refer
not to the modern usage, but go back to the fundamental mean-
ing of phenomenology as finally fixed and systematically de-
veloped and justified by Hegel." For Hegel, he reminds us,
phenomenology is "the fundamental presupposition of philo-
sophical knowledge." In contrast to the scientific method, it
seeks to understand the various "spiritual forms" from within,
not from without. It seeks moreover "to embrace the totality
of spiritual forms and to understand and evaluate them in their
mutual relations," for "the fundamental presupposition of the
phenomenological method is that the truth is the whole." With
this conception of phenomenology, Cassirer tells us, the philoso-
phy of symbolic forms is in accord, although in the application
of these principles his procedure naturally varies significantly
from that of Hegel. 22
B
The first requisite of a general theory of symbolism is an
adequate notion of the symbol and the symbolizing function.
This notion must, as Cassirer rightly points out, be a broad one,
if it is to be adequate. "The philosophy of symbols and of sym-
bolic forms is not, as some suppose, concerned primarily and
exclusively with scientific and exact concepts, but with all direc-
tions of the symbolizing function," in its attempt to grasp and
understand the world. It is necessary to study this function, not
M PSF., Ill, vi. Cassirer does not, to be sure, deny the valuable services rendered
by Phenomenology in the narrower sense of Husserl. It has, he tells us, sharpened
our sense anew for the variety of spiritual "Strukturformen" and shown us the
way in which the method of their understanding- must differ from the psychological.
As Husserl's studies have developed it becomes ever clearer that this method is not
exhausted in the analysis of knowledge, but that its task includes the investigation
of the different realms of objects, according to what they mean without reference
to their psychical conditions or the existence of their objects. The extension of this
general point of view and method from the sphere of logic to ethics and art has,
he holds, been one of the most fruitful movements of modern thought. (PSF., II,
1 6 note.)
422 WILBUR M. URBAN
only in the realm of scientific concepts but in the non-scientific
realms of poetry, art, religion, etc., not only on the level of the
conceptual but on the cognitive levels below the conceptual. 23
We lose our grasp of the whole, if we confine the symbolizing function
at the outset to the level of conceptual 'abstract' knowledge. Rather we
shall have to recognize that this function belongs not only to a single level
of the theoretical world picture, but that it conditions and carries this
picture in its totality. 2 *
How much this warning is needed is apparent when we realize
that precisely the tendency to narrow the concept of the symbol
to the logical and mathematical has been a conspicuous tendency
of recent philosophic thought.
The symbolic function belongs, then, not to a single level of
the world picture but holds throughout. It is present on the
level below conceptual knowledge, in perception itself that is
the significance of the principle of symbolischer Pragnanz
but it holds also for the realms of poetry, art, religion, and
preeminently that of science. The philosophy of symbolic
forms includes the study of the symbolizing function in all forms
of the objectification of the human spirit.
One level of the world picture on which the symbolic func-
tion is most in evidence is that of myth. The second volume of
the Philoso'phie der symbolischen Formen is entitled "Das
mythische Denken," which is in reality a discussion of the prob-
lem of Sprache und Mythos. In this without question the most
significant modern study of the myth, the entire problem of the
nature of myth, of its Erkenntmswert and of its relation to re-
ligion as symbolic form, is involved. This problem is the subject
of other papers in this volume, and we shall accordingly confine
ourselves wholly to its significance in the context of the philoso-
phy of language.
The essence of Cassirer's philosophy of myth is that the
language of the myth represents an original form of the intui-
tion of reality. In consequence, the individual categories of
mythical thinking have their own form and structure. Space,
time, number, classes, all have different meanings in mythical
*PSF, III, 1 6.
Vtd., Ill, 57.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 423
thought from those of science and constitute, in their totality
and interrelations, a "symbolic form" with its own immanent
form and significance. Into the details of this analysis we can-
not, of course, go they are among the most admirable of
Cassirer's comparative studies. It is sufficient to say that this
fundamental way of intuiting the world expresses an "organic"
aspect of reality which escapes the physico-mathematical cate-
gories of science. Part of this "critical" philosophy, therefore,
is also the thesis that the myth is to be evaluated, not by norms
taken from alien spheres, but in terms of its own form
and structure as an original and primary way of intuiting re-
ality.
The development of myth exhibits stages parallel to the
stages of language from copy, through analogy, to symbol.
Here, too, an immanent dialectic drives thought on from copy
to symbol. 25 It is here that the question of the relation of myth
to religion is raised by Cassirer and, in the last section, entitled
"Die Dialectik des mythischen Bewusstseins," is given an
answer which I believe, is, in principle at least, in the right
direction. According to this view, originally myth and religion
(and mythical and religious symbolism) were identical, or at
least inseparable and interfused. It is clearly impossible, he tells
us, to make any study of religious symbols without a study of
their relation to myth. There is no positive religion without
these elements. The further we follow the content of the re-
ligious consciousness to its beginnings, the more it is found
impossible to separate the belief content from mythical lan-
guage y one has then no longer religion in its actual historical and
cultural nature but merely a shadow picture and an empty
abstraction. Nevertheless and this is the important point for
the philosophy of religion despite this inseparable interweav-
ing of the content of myth and religion, they are far from being
identical. Neither the form nor the spirit of the two are the
same. The peculiar character of the religious form of con-
sciousness shows itself precisely in a changed attitude towards
the mythical picture of the world. It cannot do without this
world, for it is in the mythical consciousness that the immediate
"PSF, II, 2 9 *ff.
424 WILBUR M. URBAN
intuition of the meaningfulness of the world is given. Yet in
the religious consciousness the myth acquires a new meaning 5 it
becomes symbolic. Religion completes the process of develop-
ment which myth as such can not. It makes use of the sensuous
pictures and signs, but at the same time knows them to be such.
It always draws the distinction between mere existence and
meaning. 26
C
This critical theory of myth and of its relation to religion
seems to me the only tenable one, when all the relevant facts
are taken into consideration. In contrast to positivistic theories
which identify religion with myth, Cassirer's emphasis upon the
fundamental difference between the two seems to me to be of
great importance. Nor does it suffice, as in certain theories very
common at the present time, to distinguish between pre-scientific
myth, which is transitory, and permanent myth, which is the
language of religion. There is all the difference in the world
between saying that religion is myth, however permanent, and
saying that the language of myth constitutes the indispensable
source of religious symbolism 5 and Cassirer has grasped this
fundamental difference.
On the other hand, true as this conception in principle is, it
seems to me that, as formulated by Cassirer, it presents essen-
tially the same difficulties which are encountered in his philoso-
phy of language. Indeed the same ambiguity which there
appeared is present in another form in his philosophy of re-
ligious symbolism. It concerns what he calls the dialectic of
the mythical consciousness. Religion does indeed complete the
process of development which myth as such can not. But what
is this completion? He does tell us, to be sure, that religion
makes use of the sensuous pictures and signs, but at the same
time he seems also to tell us that the ideal completion of the
process would be the mystical consciousness that negative
mysticism in which the pictures and symbols are transcended
and ultimately abandoned. Undoubtedly, as the illustrations he
gives us of the dialectic, taken from the Hebrew, Persian, and
Hindu religions, indicate, every positive religion reaches a crisis
*ibid., n, 294.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 425
in which it breaks with the mythical and on its higher levels
seeks a direct approach to the absolute. Christianity also, as he
tells us, reached this crisis and "has fought this fight." It too
draws the distinction between existence and meaning. This is
doubtless true, but it is very doubtful whether any form of
religion certainly not the Christian religion and theology
ever abandons existence for meaning. It is true, again, that the
negative theology of the philosophical mystics, such as Eckhart
and Tauler, might be said to have completed the dialectical proc-
ess in this fashion, and Cassirer seems to quote them as repre-
senting the essence of the dialectic of religion. 27 But it is in the
positive rather than in the negative mystics that the essence of
Christian mysticism is to be found 5 and this form of mysticism,
as Von Hiigel has shown, includes both acceptance and tran-
scendence of the symbol. In any case and this is really the
only point I wish to raise here Cassirer's conception of the
relation of myth to religion, however valuable it may be on the
main issue, nevertheless is not wholly unambiguous, any more
than is his philosophy of language as a whole. Is it, or is it not,
the fate of religion to be dissolved into something else into a
philosophy which is no longer religious or into a mysticism
which is no longer theological?
D
Of this critical idealistic theory of the religious symbol Paul
Tillich has said that it stands in the forefront of symbol-theory
today, 28 and in this he is probably right. But this is but one phase
of Cassirer's more general theory of symbolism. The symbolic
function belongs, as we have seen, not to any single level of the
world picture, but holds throughout. By thus identifying the
symbolic with the entire range of knowledge, including the
scientific, the concept of the syrilbol and of symbolic truth has
been given a tremendous expansion and a new significance. It is,
indeed, on his view, only in the mathematical-physical sciences
that the full significance of the .philosophy of symbolic forms is
seen; for, as he tells us, "no matter how high myth and art may
" PSF, II, 3o6ff.
28 For a critical discussion of this problem sec a discussion between Paul Tillich
and myself in The Journal of Liberal Religion, Vol. II, No. i, (1940).
426 WILBUR M. URBAN
carry their constructions, they yet remain permanently rooted
in the primitive world of Ausdruckserlebnisse." 29 It is only in
the sphere of physical mathematical science that thought, so to
speak, breaks through the husk of language, with its natural
forms, and creates a world of concepts which, because of the
conscious recognition of their nature as symbols, and of science
itself as symbolic form, makes it possible to realize the ideal
immanent in knowledge from the start, namely the correlation
of phenomena in a systematic whole. It is here that the step from
substance to function is finally taken.
VI
The Language of Science: Symbolism as a Scientific Principle
A
The third volume of the Philosofhie der symbolischen
Formen is entitled Phanomenologie der Erkenntnis and the
third part of this volume bears the title, "Die Bedeutungsfunk-
tion und der Aufbau der wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnis." One
chapter is entitled "Sprache und Wissenschaft, Dingzeichen
und Ordnungszeichen" and the theme herein expressed is the
main theme of this part of our study.
"Language and science" has, indeed, become one of the cen-
tral problems of modern philosophy of science, as the problem
of symbolism has become a burning issue in scientific method-
ology. All that the scientist contributes to the fact is, according
to Poincare, the language in which it is enunciated. But, if the
relation of perception to language is such as Cassirer conceives
it, that "all" is a very great deal indeed; for there is no "fact,"
in the sense of "critical" philosophy, until it is expressed, and
the primary, if not the only, form of expression is language.
Science, so Cassirer maintains in the introduction to Das
mythische Denken, differs from the other stages of spiritual
life not in the fact that it gives us the truth itself without any
mediation through signs and symbols, but rather that science
recognizes that the symbols which it uses are symbols and
realizes this fact in a way in which the others do not. 80 This
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 427
"realization" constitutes the recognition of symbolism as a
scientific principle and the statement of this principle involv-
ing both the nature of the symbol and its relation to reality
becomes the central problem of "science as symbolic form."
It is in contrast with the copy or model theory of scientific
concepts which characterized nineteenth century physics, that
the symbolic character of these concepts is developed. If the
function of language in general is not to copy but to symbolize
reality, this is a fortiori true of scientific language. Cassirer cites
a wealth of illustrations from modern physical science to sub-
stantiate this thesis, but it is in connection with the theory of
light that this fundamental change from copy to symbol is per-
haps clearest, and Cassirer gives an excellent picture of this
development.
The corpuscular theory of Newton, according to which light
consists in very small particles, proved untenable and gave way
to the undulatory theory of Huygens, based upon an analogy
taken from perceptible phenomena and giving rise to the con-
struct of the ether as the substance which has these waves.
Contradictions arose, however, in the predicates of this hypo-
thetical ether which could not be eliminated. Physics was led
even more deeply into paradoxes, and all ad hoc hypotheses
invented to solve the difficulties served only to lead more deeply
into the morass. Finally there came the electrodynamic theory
of the field. The characteristic here is that the reality which is
designated as the "field" is no longer a complex of physical
"things" but an expression for a system of relations. But the
important thing for us is that the notion of the intuitible is com-
pletely abandoned and therefore the entire notion of the scien-
tific concept is changed. 81 This change, which we may take as
an outstanding illustration of the movement from "schematism"
to symbol in physics, illustrates also a fundamental change in
the modern symbolic consciousness of science. The symbol sym-
bolizes not things (substances) but relations (functions).
B
This symbolic theory of scientific concepts is, according to
Cassirer, "the accepted theory in physical science today" and
* Ibid.. IIL
428 WILBUR M. URBAN
he is, doubtless, on the whole justified in calling it such. He is
doubtless right also in saying that science recognizes the fact that
the concepts which it uses are symbols in a way in which other
symbolic forms do not. Certainly it represents in principle the
standpoint of such physicists as Jeans and Eddington, to say
nothing of the continental physicists he cites. For Jeans the pic-
tures are the fables with which we deck our mathematical equa-
tions j for Eddington they are dummies in our mathematical
equations. Symbolism as a scientific principle means, then, in
the words of Cassirer, that
physics has finally abandoned the reality of description and representa-
tion in order to enter upon a realm of greater abstraction. The schema-
tism of pictures has given place to a symbolism of principles. Physics
is concerned no longer with the actual itself, but with its structure and
formal principles. The tendency to unification has conquered the tend-
ency to intuitive representation. The synthesis which is possible through
pure concepts of law and relation has shown itself more valuable than
the apprehension in terms of objects or things. Order and relation have,
then, become the basal concepts of physics. 32
To say that physical science, in the later stages of its develop-
ment, is no longer concerned with the actual, but solely with
formal principles and structure, is seemingly to enunciate a
paradox of the most astounding sort. This view, however,
Cassirer is careful to point out, does not in the least signify
that science has abandoned sense experience. Science, he tells us,
"starts with observable objects and is not content until it de-
duces from its concepts or theories objects and events which
can also be observed. Without this connection with sense, how-
ever indirect and remote, there is no verification.
The meaning of the principle must be ultimately empirically and intui-
tively fulfilled, but this fulfilment (Erjullung) is never possible directly,
but only insofar as from the supposition of its validity other propositions
are derived by means of an hypothetical deduction. None of these
propositions, none of the individual stages in this logical process, need
be capable of a direct sensory interpretation. Only as a logical totality
*, Ill, 545.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 429
can the series of deductions be referred to observation and be proved
and justified by it. 33
"Only as logical totality" this is the significant point. Since
none of the individual propositions requires reference to sensu-
ous intuition, there is a gradual shift of the locus of verification
from the intuitible to the meaningful. "Objectivity" in modern
physics is not a problem of representation (Darstellung) but
it is a problem of meaning alone ("ein reines Bedeutungsprob-
In this last statement we have not only the heart of Cassirer's
philosophy of science, but of the entire philosophy of symbolic
forms, of which the scientific form is but a part. For the study
of modern science shows us, what the philosophy of symbolic
forms has continually emphasized, that all spiritual life and all
spiritual development consist in nothing else than in such in-
tellectual metamorphoses and in this passage from repre-
sentation to the . creation of meaningful structures. Scientific
knowledge repeats, in a different dimension to be sure, the
same process which characterizes language and myth, a fact
which, as we shall see, raises again, in an acute form, the funda-
mental problem of the knowledge value of all the symbolic
forms.
In that in physical science the concept of substance has given
place to that of function and the concepts of physics are found
to symbolize not things but relations, mathematics, as the
science of relations far excellence, becomes for Cassirer central
in his entire treatment of science as symbolic form. His philoso-
phy of mathematics, like his theory of logic, is a topic which
belongs to other contributors, but some comment seems neces-
sary in the present context. Here only one problem can be
raised. It concerns the question of what we may call the "lan-
guage of mathematics" and mathematics as symbolic form.
The main problem, of course, is that of the function of mathe-
matical symbols in modern physical science; but this involves
"Ibid., Ill, 538.
84 /Ml., in, 552.
430 WILBUR M. URBAN
also the problem of the philosophical basis of pure mathematics.
Starting with the definition of mathematics as the science of
numbers, and with the definition of numbers as symbols con-
structed for the ordering activities of the understanding, there
is created the problem of the truth value of these symbols
themselves.
Are they mere signs to which no objective meaning is to be assigned or
have they a fandamentum in re? And if the latter is the case where
are we to seek this basis? Is it given, ready-made, in the "intuition;" or
must it, apart from and independently of the intuitively given, gain and
secure its validity in the independent activities of the understanding, in
pure spontaneity of thought? With these questions we find ourselves in
the very center of the methodological struggle which is presently raging
about the meaning and content of the fundamental mathematical con-
cepts. , . . What does this question mean for our own fundamental prob-
lem of symbolical thinking? 35
The solution of this problem involves the entire dispute
between the intuitive and the formal or symbolic theories in
modern mathematics, and Cassirer's analysis of modern mathe-
matical theory is one of the most important, as it is one of the
most enlightening, phases of his work. So far as the basal prob-
lem is concerned, his answer is that the above disjunction is
neither unequivocal nor complete. Mathematics, he holds, has
objective significance, but that significance does not lie in any
immediate correlation with the intuited world of "nature," but
rather in the fact that, by constructing this world according to
its own formal principles, it is enabled thereby to understand its
laws. I have neither the space nor the competence to develop his
solution of this problem in detail it is but an application of the
principle that the function of "language," in any form, is not to
copy reality but to symbolize it rather shall I note his com-
ment on the opposition of realistic and idealistic theory in
mathematics. A true and valid conception of the symbolic in the
mathematical field, as in other fields, does not, he tells us,
consort well with the traditional dualism of idealism and
realism, subject and object, but rather transcends them. "The
symbolic belongs neither ... to the sphere of the immanent nor
*lbid., ill, 414.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 431
to that of the transcendent; its value consists precisely in the
fact that it enables us to transcend these oppositions. It is not
the one nor the other, but 'the one in the other' and c the other
in the one'." 36
It is, however, as we have seen, in the transition from the
schematism of pictures to the symbolism of principles that the
role of mathematics has become increasingly significant in
modern science. Order has thereby become the "absoluter
Grundbegrif" of modern physics. For modern physical science
the world presents itself no longer as a collection of entities,
but as an order of happenings or events. Cassirer quotes with
apparent approval a statement of Weyl in this connection.
Neither intuitive space nor intuitive time, but only a four-dimensional
continuum in the abstract mathematical sense, may serve as the medium
in which physics constructs the external world. If color consisted
"actually" of ether- vibrations as for Huyghens, it appears now only as
mathematical functional processes of a periodic character, whereby four
independent variables occur in the functions as representatives of the
spatio-temporal medium referring to co-ordinates. What remains, then,
finally is a symbolic construction in precisely the sense in which Hilbert
carried such construction through in the field of mathematics. 87
Thus do the intuited space and time of the immediate Ausdrucks-
erlebnisse become the ideal space-time which, as Cassirer said,
while keeping the form of sensuous experience, progressively
fills that form with non-sensuous ideal content and makes the
sensuous form a symbol of the ideal.
D
In such fashion, then, does science, as symbolic form, find its
place in Cassirer's. more general idealistic philosophy of lan-
guage and of symbolic forms. This symbolic theory of scientific
concepts is, I suppose, not only the "accepted theory today" but
one to which, as I believe, we are forced by the developments of
modern scientific methodology. Nevertheless, as formulated by
98 ibid., m, 44 4 f.
$T ?F, III, 546. The quotation from Weyl is taken from his Philosophic der
Mathematik und Naturwissenschaft, found in Handbuch der Philosophic, 80.
432 WILBUR M. URBAN
Cassirer, it presents certain difficulties not wholly unrelated to
those found in other parts of his general philosophy.
The primary difficulty arises out of an ambiguity in Cassirer's
conception of science. The basal science, on his view, is the
mathematical-physical, for here the essential law of all knowl-
edge manifests itself completely j and it is for this type of science
that his theory of scientific symbolism is developed. But there
are other sciences ("so-called," at least), biology, psychology,
etc., to say nothing of the Geisteswissenschaften, which, so to
speak, employ other languages and exhibit very different sym-
bolic form. Are they science or are they not? It is possible to
hold, with many scientists, that they are really not science
that the universe is exhaustively analyzable into terms of pure
mathematics, and only insofar as this analysis is carried out do
we have science, properly speaking. This is a possible view, but
it is very questionable whether the concepts of the mathematical
sciences are most suitable for the biologist and psychologist, to
say nothing of history and the other Geisteswissenschaften.
Living organisms and conscious minds are, to be sure, a part of
nature, but the concepts of nature developed in mathematical
physics are scarcely such as to express adequately their nature
as living and conscious. On the other hand, we may say that
these are really science j and if that is the case the essential
law of all knowledge does not manifest itself completely in the
mathematical-physical sphere j nor is the concept of symbol
developed in this sphere adequate to all forms of scientific sym-
bolism. We are forced to a concept of "double symbolism" in
science, such as I have developed in Language and Reality
It may be said, of course, that the issue here is largely verbal
and concerns merely the question of the "definition" of science.
But I do not believe that this is all there is to this problem. It
concerns the much more fundamental question of whether the
ideal of knowledge is really realized in the mathematical-physi-
cal form, whether, in short, there are not other aspects of reality
the adequate expression of which requires a different kind of
symbolism. Of the fact itself, of this "double symbolism," there
is no doubt j the only question is whether we call this symbolic
38 Language and Reality, 5235.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 433
form, other than that in the mathematical sciences, science or not.
It is not, of course, my intention to argue these points here I
have done so in another context but merely to suggest an im-
portant point at which Cassirer's philosophy of science leaves
important questions unanswered.
Closely connected with this problem is one no less funda-
mental, and one which involves an ambiguity no less disturbing
than the preceding. It concerns the relation of the scientific,
more specifically the mathematical symbol, to ordinary lan-
guage.
The ideal of science seems to be to pass from a language of
things to a language of pure relations, a language which by an
immanental necessity tends to become the language of mathe-
matics. Science breaks through the husk of ordinary language,
with its connotations, into a world of "pure notation." It be-
comes wholly ^pronomlnaly to use Karl Vossler's expression. The
question, then, arises as to the relation of this mathematical
symbolism to natural language. I am not sure as to Cassirer's
position at this point 5 here also he seems to be ambiguous.
According to him, the relation of mathematical symbols to
"natural" language seems to parallel the relation of religion to
myth. As the religious consciousness cannot abandon completely
the mythical picture of the world, although it surpasses and
transcends it, so the scientific and mathematical language never
quite abandons the speech forms from which it developed.
All "rigorous science," Cassirer tells us, demands that thought
shall "free itself from the compulsion of the word;" 39 but this
is never completely possible. The issue, as I see it, is not
whether it is possible, but whether it is desirable. A mathe-
matical equation, until it is interpreted, "says nothing," and I
cannot see how it can be interpreted except in terms of "natural"
language which involves inevitably those "pre-scientific" cate-
gories, of substance and attribute, which, according to this
theory of science, it is the ideal of science to transcend.
I find, then, in Cassirer an ambiguity which I also find
present in many modern physicists. On the one hand, we find
them speaking of electrons, etc., as the symbols "with which
*PSF, III, 382.
434 WILBUR M. URBAN
we deck our mathematical equations }" the assumption being
that the equations, the mathematical relations, express the non-
symbolic aspects of reality. On the other hand, these same
mathematical signs, which make up the equations, are them-
selves characterized as symbols with the result that we are
left uncertain as to what is symbol and what reality. My own
view which I do not, of course, wish to argue here is that
mathematical symbols are merely "pronominal," they merely
manipulate, and, until they are translated into non-mathemati-
cal terms, "say nothing." I should be disposed to say with
Brouwer that mathematics is "weit mehr ein Thun denn tine
Lehre" Yet, whatever pure mathematics may be, mathematical
physics is not a mere Thun> (activity or manipulation), but
also a Lehre or theory a theory of the nature of reality, a
theory which, as I believe, can be stated only in terms of natural
language and of the categories which naturally belong to such
language. In other words, physical theory must ultimately pre-
suppose a metaphysics which cannot be merely a symbolism of
relations but must be a symbolism of things.
The questions here raised, important as they are, do not,
however, affect, I think, the general critical-idealistic philoso-
phy of science. The essence of that interpretation of science,
as it is for all those who thus conceive it, is that science is one
symbolic form among other symbolic forms. Science, Cassirer
would say with Weyl, I think, concedes to idealism that its
objective world is not given, but only propounded like a prob-
lem to be solved, and that it can only be constructed by symbols.
He would also say with Eddington, I think, that the explora-
tion of the external world by science leads not to concrete
reality, but to a world of symbols beneath which these methods
are not adapted to penetrating. In saying these things, if he
says them, he would also say, by implication, that there are other
symbolic forms which are more adapted if not to penetrate
into concrete reality (Cassirer would probably not wish to use
this expression), certainly more adapted to expressing concrete
reality. But there is a further implication of this theory of
science which he could scarcely avoid, namely, that science, so
understood, presupposes a metaphysics. Not only is art as
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 435
symbolic form une metaphysique figuree, to use Bergson's
terms, but science is also. The ideal of modern science, as con-
ceived by Cassirer, is expressed in the postulate that nothing
shall be admitted to science which is not resolvable into the
sensible and the measurable. But this postulate presupposes
that there is a metaphysical sphere not thus resolvable. If so,
the question arises whether, corresponding to this sphere, there
is not a language of metaphysics and a metaphysical symbolism.
VII
The Language of Metaphysics and The Nature of
Philosophical Discourse
One of the chief problems which face any one who realizes
the issues raised by the problem of the relation of language to
thought and knowledge is that of the language of philosophy.
The philosophy of symbolic forms is philosophy and not
science} although, of course, the results of scientific investiga-
tion find their place in the phenomenology of these forms.
What, then, is the character of philosophical language?
That there is such a thing as philosophical discourse, as con-
trasted with scientific, is recognized by Cassirer in his acceptance
of the Hegelian principle that the phenomenological method
is the presupposition of philosophy and in the application of
this method to the philosophy of symbolic forms. It is recog-
nized also that philosophical discourse involves a radical shift
from the sphere of things (that of science) to the sphere of
meanings (and values). The traditional view, of course, is that
this discourse is identical with that of metaphysics that the
language of philosophy and that of metaphysics are one. This
view has, however, been challenged in the modern world, not
only by positivism but by certain interpretations of the Kantian
"critical" philosophy. Cassirer's position is one continuous
critique of positivism in all spheres of the human spirit} it is
not so clear what his position is regarding Kant and meta-
physics. In any case, it seems obvious that a philosophy of
436 WILBUR M. URBAN
symbolic forms, to be in any sense complete, must include a
study of the language and the form which we call metaphysical.
B
In the entire three volumes there is only one point at which
the problem of metaphysics is presented at all the section in
Vol. Ill, entitled "Intuitive and Symbolic Knowledge in Mod-
ern Metaphysic." It is a critique of Bergson's position in which
metaphysics is defined as the science which seeks to dispense
with symbols "the most radical denial," as Cassirer rightly
says, "of the right of all symbol formation which has ever
appeared in the history of metaphysics." 40
Cassirer's criticism of Bergson at this point is, I believe, fully
justified. Quite rightly he points out that this sharp contrast,
between the way of metaphysical intuition and the way of
science and knowledge, shows Bergson to be the son of a
naturalistic epoch in which all activity of the intellect is re-
duced to the purely vital or biological. Quite rightly also he
points out the impossibility of a purely intuitive metaphysics 5
for it would not be any kind of knowledge, even metaphysical,
unless it gave us some description of the "vital force," and
this too requires theoretical or form elements 5 in other words,
metaphysical knowledge must be symbolic form also.
This criticism of a purely intuitive metaphysics seems to
imply both the right to a metaphysical language and also to sym-
bolic construction in metaphysics. We look, therefore, for a
further development of the language of metaphysics and of
symbolism as a metaphysical principle; but little light is thrown
upon either the nature of metaphysics or the character of its
language and symbolism. Just as we feel that we are about to
put our hands on the key to the solution of the problem, Cas-
sirer remarks, "Aber wir brechen an diesem Punkte ab." (Ill,
4.8) All that can be asked, he continues, is a journey round the
world, the globus intellectualis. It would seem, then, that the
philosophy of symbolic forms is intended to be just such a
journey neither penetration into the essence of "reality" nor
an ultimate interpretation of its meaning. It is apparently
40 PSF, III, 42ff, esp. 43 and 44.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 437
merely a phenomenology, not a metaphysics that is offered us.
Nevertheless, it seems doubtful whether a philosophy of lan-
guage and of symbolic forms can stop at this point. Even in a
journey around the globus intellectualis the traveller will in-
evitably come upon a region in which men talk a language which
is neither that of science, as understood by Cassirer, nor of myth
and poetry a language and symbolic form which can only be
called metaphysical. That there is such a language can, I think,
scarcely be denied. If the various symbolic forms, art, religion,
science, all, in their several ways, constitute une metcrphysique
figuree, then there must be, it would seem, a language of meta-
physics in which these symbolic forms are expanded and inter-
preted. As metaphysical "postulation" is necessary to round
out our world of experience, so metaphysical language is neces-
sary to make these other languages intelligible. Elsewhere I
have myself attempted a study of this unique language and of
the nature of the symbolic structure called metaphysics. 41 I
have, of course, no intention of going into that here, but desire
merely to suggest that this is one of the gaps in Cassirer's
thought which I am unable to fill, and that precisely here the
fundamental ambiguity in his evaluation of language is in evi-
dence.
It would doubtless be an impertinence should I venture to
indicate what, had Cassirer carried out this task, his conception
of the language of metaphysics and of metaphysics as symbolic
form would have been. It may be permitted, however, to sug-
gest the point at which, in attempting to understand Cassirer,
I have found myself thrown into confusion and uncertainty. If
the ideal form and immanental law of all knowledge is, indeed,
to be found in the mathematical-physical sciences, then it would
seem that the symbolism of metaphysics must also be a sym-
bolism of relations and that a philosophy of events, such as
that of Whitehead for instance, would necessarily be the re-
sultant metaphysics. On the other hand, if it is true, as we are
told by Cassirer, that science as symbolic form has no exclusive
value, but is only one way of constructing reality, and has value
only from the standpoint of science, then it would appear that
41 Language and Reality, Chap. XIII.
438 WILBUR M. URBAN
a metaphysics, to be adequate, must be a metaphysics of art
and religion also and must have a language and symbolic form
which includes these forms also in which case it could no
longer be a symbolism of relations merely, but must be a
symbolism of things also.
But all this may be beside the point. It may be, after all,
that it is merely a phenomenology and not a metaphysics with
which Cassirer presents us. The question always remains, I
suppose, whether, as in the case of Kant, the critical transcen-
dental method is the denial of metaphysics or itself a meta-
physics. This is, I believe, an ambiguity inherent in the Kantian
position and one shared by the philosophy of symbolic forms
itself. If so, this ambiguity must take its place beside the
other forms of ambiguity which have presented themselves at
various stages of the development of this philosophy. The key
to the understanding of knowledge, Cassirer tells us, is the
Kantian principle that we must have our eyes, not on the
results, but on the processes of knowledge. 42 That may be an
important key to understanding, but it is scarcely sufficient
for evaluation; it may reveal to us the meaning of the process,
but can scarcely determine the truth of its result. This brings
us to the problem of meaning and truth in Cassirer's philosophy.
VIII
Language and Reality. The Problem of Meaning and Truth
A
How much the present writer has learned from his journey
in Cassirer's company around the globus intellectualis, is, I
hope, fully clear from the sympathetic presentation of the main
points of his philosophy of symbolic forms. But that I have
still much to learn is clear also from the fact that I have been
forced to confess my perplexity at certain crucial points. What
has puzzled me has already been suggested by the indication
of certain ambiguities present in his philosophy of language eo
nomine, and which have grown in significance as we have passed
on to the wider implications of his philosophy.
4 *PSF, III, 7ff, esp. 8.
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE
The critical position which Cassirer maintains throughoir
plicitly denies exclusive value to any one of the fundair
symbolic forms. Modern science has come to recognize, he
that its concepts or symbols are constructions for a spe
pose, namely, "to deduce, as from models, what will
in the external world." As such "they correspond to tl
point of science and have no ultimate meaning out
standpoint." Art and religion are equally symbc
equally ways of representing the world. "None of th
Cassirer tells us, is a "direct reproduction of realist
facts." All share in the common character of beit
of expression of one spiritual principle. All have
they all also have truth?
To none of these forms, therefore, does Cass"
ing or significance. The question is whether
includes the truth- value of knowledge. I may
this point also Cassirer seems to me to give ar
It is true that he seems to conceive them aL
edge and truth. Even to the mythical for
value. From the standpoint of the proble
maintains "relative truth" can be no lor
significantly enough, he puts the wor
marks. 43 As for all "critical" philosopi
theory, the myth expresses aspects of
matical-physical language cannot expr
art and religion, which make use o*
bolically, are a fortiori forms of trut
aspect of his thought. It is in science
law of knowledge finds its supra"
higher symbolic form with a tr
quotation marks. We cannot esc
as symbolic form, is not only t
that shall supersede all other
further suspicion that, when "
the other forms, it is with a
the present writer at least, s*
"ibid., n, 19.
WILBUR M. URBAN
splendid structure which Cassirer has erected in these three
nes.
"> tendencies strive for supremacy in Cassirer's thought,
d they do in all forms of philosophy which draw their
spiration from the ideals of knowledge of a scientific
; deals upon which Kant himself seemed at least to set
<natur. On the one hand, there is the narrow conception
'hich it seems difficult to avoid in this age of science.
xssages in Cassirer's works this seems to be the truth
wcellence y as it was for Kant in one of his philo-
-. On the assumption that the basal conception and
knowledge are completely shown in the methods
' seems inevitable. On the other hand, another
strives for recognition in Cassirer's thought, as
n the thought of any one who is as conversant
readth and depth of human culture a concep-
words of John Dewey, is "broader and more
;n which Kant also put his imprimatur in
>sophical moods. It is the dilemma under-
Ulemmas into which the modern mind has
that Cassirer had a solution for this
>nly my own failure to bring the many
gument into a significant whole which
it. None the less, I fail to see it, and
ask for more light. There is, indeed,
at which, if I understand it aright,
-er tells us, contains in itself an
'drives it on unmercifully further
any boundary hitherto reached."
notion, adaequatio intellectus et
merely with calling in question
world picture, but seizes upon
f ." The outcome of this inner
e notion of truth to that of
to a realm of pure meaning
d new difficulties, it never-
PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE 441
theless results in the subordination of the notion of truth to that
of meaning" 44 a subordination which, as we have seen, is as
much a feature of the development of modern physical science
as of any other symbolic form 5 for objectivity in modern physics
is not a problem of representation (f>arstellung)^ but of mean-
ing alone (ein reines Bedeutwngsproblem).
This subordination of truth to meaning is obviously suscep-
tible of two interpretations. On the one hand, it may be so
interpreted as to express a widespread tendency in modern
philosophy one shared by positivism and instrumentalism
alike namely, to insist upon the existence of realms of mean-
ing or significance (such as those of art and metaphysics) in
which notions of truth and falsity are irrelevant and into which,
as it has been said, "truth has no right to enter." On the other
hand, it may be so interpreted as to express the notion that,
in the development of thought which has resulted in the sub-
ordination of truth to meaning, truth has a right to enter because
the meaningful is already true, for truth and meaning ulti-
mately coincide. The sum total of meaningful discourse is the
truth.
This is my own solution of the problem, as developed in
Language and Reality. I hope it is Cassirer's also, for then it
would not only be true that I have learned immensely from his
philosophy of symbolic forms, but also that from this learning
I have not drawn consequences which would be disavowed by
Cassirer himself. I hope it is his solution also, for the reason
that from this solution of the problem would follow, I think,
the answers to the other problems which I have felt constrained
to raise in the course of these discussions.
WILBUR M. URBAN
YALE UNIVERSITY
NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT
44 PSF, III, 6ff.j also 3*8ff.
'3
James Gutmann
CASSIRER'S HUMANISM
13
CASSIRER'S HUMANISM
ASSIRER'S Humanism is not a segment or portion o
his philosophy j it is an aspect of all his writing and teach-
ing. It permeates his thought in his historical studies and also
in his theoretical and systematic works. As a student of the
history of ideas, Cassirer concentrated his interest and attention
on those great figures and ages of intellectual history in which
the humanistic interest was especially prominent. His studies
of Plato and Platonism in ancient thought and in later times,
of the philosophy of the Renaissance in its ethical and cosmo-
logical speculations, and of the age of the Enlightenment are
some of the evidences of his interest in the traditions of human-
ism. His work as an editor of Leibniz and Kant, his biography
of Kant and his studies of Descartes, Kepler, Leibniz, and
others, reflect a prevailing sense of philosophy's relation to other
cultural interests. Even his most technical contributions to
linguistics and to epistemological and mathematical theory re-
veal his pervasive humanistic concern. The relation of these
specialized studies to his great systematic work is signally illus-
trated in his essay on Language and Myth, which was written
at the very time when he was formulating the Philosofhie der
symbolischen Formen. And the significance of Cassirer's human-
ism in his conception of symbolic forms is definitively expressed
in the synoptic version of his system, his Essay on Man.
The philosophy of symbolic forms starts from the presupposition that,
if there is any definition of the nature or "essence" of man, this defini-
tion can only be understood as a functional one, not a substantial one.
We cannot define man by any inherent principle which constitutes his
metaphysical essence nor can we define him by any inborn faculty or
instinct that may be ascertained by empirical observation. Man's out-
445
446 JAMES GUTMANN
standing characteristic, his distinguishing mark, is not his metaphysical
or physical nature but his work. It is this work, it is the system of
human activities, which defines and determines the circle of "humanity."
Language, myth, religion, art, science, history are the constituents, the
various sectors of this circle. 1
The present paper will not, of course, attempt to review
Cassirer's achievements as a humanist in all the ranges of his
work. However, while stressing his contribution to the humani-
ties, it will consider his literary and artistic interests in relation
to that "philosophical anthropology" which is, after all, the
equivalent in Greek dress of wisdom-loving humanism. The
designation of "philosophical anthropology" was chosen by
Cassirer himself, following in Kant's footsteps, to describe the
content of the seminar in which he was engaged at the time of
his death. Cassirer's use of Kant's terms in this seminar as in
his Essay on Man showed at one and the same time his reverence
for Kant and the independence with which he unlike some of
the neo-Kantians employed the Kantian legacy.
Though Cassirer's modification of Kant raised difficulties
both in his historical work and in his systematic writing, this
paper, while considering some of them below, is particularly
designed to show how other elements, borrowed and original,
contributed to Cassirer's humanism. After considering some of
these elements, notably the influence of German Romanticism,
a brief review of Cassirer's own summary of the history of
Western humanism will lead back naturally to certain aspects
of his Kantianism, not only in its relevance to his position as
a humanist historian, but also to the relation of his views on his-
tory to his other humanistic interests. That his humanism is one
of the constant factors in the wide range of his interests and in all
his contributions to philosophy is the thesis of this paper. Cas-
sirer is a follower of Kant, but is surely not to be interpreted as
a neo-Kantian in any limited sense. He stands in many tradi-
tions, among them, neither last nor least, in the great tradition
of philosophic humanism.
1 Essay on Man y 67-68.
CASSIRER'S HUMANISM 447
I
It is significant that Cassirer came to philosophy as a student
of literature and linguistics. Though his publications include
numerous technical studies not only of mathematics but of
physics and psychology, his initial interest in languages and
literature remained a major preoccupation. His studies of
German culture, Freiheit und Form> as well as some of the
essays which compose his subsequent Idee und Gestalt anticipate
in nuce doctrines concerning myth and language which he de-
veloped in his later writings. Goethe and Schiller, Herder,
Kleist and Holderlin, Lessing and Rousseau are figures to
whom he returned again and again, not only to use them to
illuminate the work of other more technical philosophers, but
for their own sake. He wrote on Goethe and Plato or on Goethe
and Kant y but he is as much interested in Goethe's Pandora
and Faust as in Goethe's views on natural science or in Goethe
and mathematical physics. He discussed Lessing and Mendels-
sohn or Schiller and Shaftesbury with as much emphasis on
the more literary as on the more technically philosophical
writer. His study of Holderlin foreshadowed the exhaustive
analysis of mythopoeic imagination in which he later developed
the insights of modern romanticism and particularly of Schel-
ling's philosophy of mythology and revelation.
Though following Helmholtz, Otto Liebmann, and Cas-
sirer's own teacher, Hermann Cohen, "back to Kant," and
though adhering to Kantian principles, Cassirer repeatedly
proved his indebtedness to some of the insights of certain post-
Kantian writers, notably Humboldt and Schelling. Rejecting
the metaphysical absolutism which prevailed in Fichte, in
Schelling's emphasis on the Infinite, and especially in Hegel,
and though critical of the psychological approach made by
Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, he found in Romanticism's aware-
ness of the significance of myth, of poetic imagery and cultural
continuity, elements worthy of being added to the stern and
rigorous discipline of Kantianism. Never forgetting Kant's in-
sistence that all philosophy must regard the dualism between
448 JAMES GUTMANN
being and becoming as a logical rather than a metaphysical
dualism and that it must accept the findings of science as its
data, he nevertheless concerned himself with the processes of
change, of becoming, which Romanticism emphasizes. Differing
from Kant and agreeing with Humboldt that speculation re-
garding the genesis and essence of language is not the business
of the philosopher, he carried forward the study of linguistics
for which Jacob Grimm had laid the foundations. Conceiving
man not as homo sapiens nor as homo jaber but as animal
symbolicum, he concerned himself with symbolic forms in all
aspects of man's experience.
To what extent this fusion of neo-Kantianism with interests
and problems largely foreign to Kant's thought generated diffi-
culties for Cassirer need not be questioned now. But any under-
standing of man as animal symbolicum requires at least a brief
consideration of Cassirer's use of mythopoeic data. Cassirer
traced the relation of myth to speculative thought from Plato
and neo-Platonism to such modern writers as Giambattista Vico,
Holderlin and Schelling. Though the attitudes of these and
other related thinkers differ with regard to the precise signifi-
cance of mythical elements in human nature and culture, they
agree in conceiving mythic apprehension as more than meta-
phorical or allegorical. None of them sees the symbolic func-
tion of myth precisely as Cassirer himself came to view it; but
Schelling approaches this view more closely than the others.
Moreover, Cassirer construed Schelling's Philosophic der
Mythologie as being, in part, an elaboration and development
of an early intuition of Holderlin's. "Mythopoeic imagery,"
he wrote, "is no mere ornament which we incidentally add to
our portrait of reality, but it is one of the necessary organs
for the apprehension of reality itself. In it we find the world
and life first truly revealed and made significant." 2
As this statement, quoted from Cassirer's essay on "Holderlin
and German Idealism," suggests, he acknowledged this early
anticipation of his conception of mythopoeic imagination as a
necessary organ of apprehension which he developed especially
in the second volume of the Philosophie der symbolischen
* Idee und Gestalt, 121.
CASSIRER'S HUMANISM 449
Formen. In spite of Cassirer's diagnosis of Holderlin's intel-
lectual limitations, his appreciation of Holderlin's artistic in-
sights reveals a fundamental sympathy. If he denies Holderlin
a position of great importance in the history of philosophy, he
credits him with a high degree of poetic inspiration. It is sig-
nificant, moreover, that, though he bases his own estimate of
Holderlin's artistic greatness on the poet's concern with mythic
imagery, he also finds this the source of his chief philosophic
deficiency. He seems to be convinced that Holderlin's absorption
in mythology actually interfered with his attaining an adequate
total conception of human nature and human history. Holder-
lin happily reacted against those eighteenth century thinkers
who treated myth only in a derogatory sense j but Cassirer
finds his attainments in philosophy negligible despite Holder-
lin's "lifelong earnest wrestling with philosophic problems,
since he was never a systematic thinker." It remained for Schel-
ling, who recognized myth as a product of man's collective
imagination, not only to see myth as a great and indestructible
force basic to all culture, but also to formulate the first sys-
tematic philosophy of mythology.
Whether or not this estimate of Holderlin be accepted is less
important, at least in the present context, than the circumstance
that Cassirer's judgment is based on his insistence concerning
the lack of system in Holderlin's thought. It is not entirely clear
whether he believes such a lack of system to be due to tempera-
mental limitations or to the inadequacy of a humanism which
fails to recognize the importance of non-literary and non-
artistic elements as expressions of human nature. Be that as it
may, it is evidence of the primary importance which Cassirer
attached to systematic construction in philosophy.
II
However much Cassirer differed from Alexander Pope, the
title of whose poem he used for his Essay on Man y he agreed
with him that "the proper study of mankind is man." To be
sure, Cassirer included in such a study many elements which
would have seemed irrelevant not only to Pope but to the
philosophers of his day who discussed human nature. Indeed,
450 JAMES GUTMANN
the history of the interpretation of human nature from the time
when the Greeks inscribed "Know Thyself" on the Temple
of Apollo would show striking contrasts not only with regard
to the content and scope of such knowledge but also with
respect to the methods of pursuing it. The anthropological phi-
losophy which Kant fathered seems often to have been neglected
by philosophers who claimed to be Kantians. It itself has under-
gone significant changes. Yet every example of it which is
worthy of its founder combines the ethical imperative char-
acteristic of Kant with the scepticism that underlies his Critiques
but which is, like all genuine scepticism, the "counterpart of
resolute humanism.'*
"The starting point of all anthropological philosophy," writes
Bernard Groethuysen in his essay "Towards an Anthropological
Philosophy,"
or all philosophy of man, is the ancient maxim, c Know Thyself.' But
what is it that man wishes to know about himself? What are the
questions which he puts to himself? 'Know Thyself* is the command.
. . . [But this] means not simply try to define yourself by concepts, . . .
but become conscious of yourself, live in the consciousness of yourself,
understand yourself, come to experience yourself, be present to yourself,
live in the awareness of your present, come to yourself. 4
As Socrates interpreted the Delphic injunction, it meant not
merely that the unexamined life was no life for man, but that
self-knowledge by its very nature could not be achieved in
isolation, that it involved a co-operative venture and that the
individual, to be truly known, must be known not only in all
his social relations but, indeed, required the assistance of others
to achieve this very knowledge. In Socrates, "philosophy,
which had hitherto been conceived as an intellectual monologue,
is transformed into a dialogue. Only by way of dialogical or
dialectic thought can we approach the knowledge of human
nature." 5 Socrates finds his teachers among those who dwell in
the city and is content to interrogate an unschooled slave boy,
if only the latter can add to his knowledge of the nature of
8 Essay on Man, i .
4 Philosophy and History ^ ed. by Klibansky and Paton, 77,
5 Essay on Man, 5.
CASSIRER'S HUMANISM 451
man. It is surely in this sense that "his philosophy, if he pos-
sesses a philosophy," is strictly anthropological.
Doubtless one of the aspects of Renaissance culture which
has drawn scholars like Cassirer again and again to study its art
and thought is the reaffirmation, involved in its cultural rebirth,
of